Monty Python's 'Two Towers'
by Morthoron
Summary: Appalling sequel to Monty Python's 'Fellowship of the Ring', disgusting successor to Monty Python's 'The Hobbit', and nearly as famous as Monty Python's 'Not Appearing as a Fan-Fiction Story'. Winner of the coveted 'Necrotic Albatross' Lesion of Honor.
1. Chapter 1

**COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER:** _This is a not-for-profit story, and is in no way meant for publication; therefore, both the Tolkien Estate and the members of Monty Python can rest assured, there will be no royalties due and nothing forthcoming in the way of monetary remuneration for the meager author of this farcical romp through Middle-earth._

**CONTENT DISCLAIMER:**_ This Lord of the Rings parody emulates the style of Monty Python; therefore, it is irreverent, entirely random and suffused with mild profanity and sexual inyerendo...excuse me, I meant innuendo. If you find any of this type of material objectionable, rather than getting your knickers in a bunch, stop right here -- lest you be transformed, like Lot's overly-inquisitive wife, into a pillar of salt, at which point we shall use you to rime our margarita glasses or brine our pickles._

**FURTHER DISCLAIMERS:**_ If you have an aversion to nipples, goiters or dental appliances, you should not read this parody. If your country of origin is Portugal, Lithuania, Peru or Liechtenstein, you should avoid this parody. If you are religious, particularly Catholic, Protestant, Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Animist or Wiccan, you should contact your pastor, priest, rabbi, cleric, guru, shaman or coven leader before reading this parody. Previous readers have experienced bouts of nausea, dizziness, necrotic skin lesions and putrescent flatulence after merely coming into contact with this parody. If you are offended by abuse or implied abuse of llamas, mammoth egg-laying cave moose, albatross, figs and granola bars, do not read this parody. If you read this parody for more than four hours, consult your optician. Readers of this parody have a 42% higher chance of developing Tourette syndrome as opposed to those readers taking a placebo. Incidences of Bubonic Plague occurred more often in the 14th century, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the Black Death will not return while you are reading this parody. In case of a sudden cataclysm of an apocalyptic nature, suspend reading this parody, stick you head between your legs and kiss your arse goodbye._

**BOOK II: MONTY PYTHON'S 'TWO TOWERS' **

_**~~Bein' Part th' Second 'o' Lor' 'o' th' Rings 'n' all ~~**_

**Chapter None: Synopsis **

**(As Presented by Clive R.R. Bowels, Critic and Publisher Emeritus, **

**Coupon Clippers Weekly, Penceworth, Hampshire)**

Welcome to the second part of _The Lord of the Rings_ parody.

It has been at least a week since I stumbled upon the first part of this parody, _Monty Python's 'Fellowship of the Ring'_, while searching the internet for late 19th century pornography, with a particular interest in sepia-tinted Daguerreotypes of bulbous white buttocks brimming from billowing cotton bloomers. Needless to say, my computer contracted some sort of 'Trojan' virus, which is interesting, because I was engaged – rather handily, I might add – in viewing naughty materials that decorum prohibits me from describing here. Fortunately, my cousin, Wimpole, who has quite an extensive background in contracting viruses from pornography sites, downloaded an anti-virus program that eradicated the nasty worm. Rather like a penicillin shot for the clap, eh wot?

That is when I arrived, somehow or another, at the fan-fiction site that houses the aforementioned parody. I say 'somehow or another' because I was actually looking for sites that contained pornographic material relating to _Fan Dancing_, and one selection concerned 'fan-friction', an occupational hazard relating to the chaffed skin _Fan Dancers_ get while doing the bump and grind. Needless to say, one false click of the mouse landed me someplace other than where I was intending to go. And, as you are probably aware, the difference between _friction_ and _fiction_ is not merely in the diction, but in the depiction as well, at least according to my predilection. Speaking of Fan Dancing, I recall that the famous Sally Rand – not to be confused with Ayn Rand of _Atlas Shrugged_ fame, Sally shrugged something altogether different – was once arrested four times in one day for indecent exposure; but, of course, that type of exposure is the very type a dancer cavorting about half-naked behind a feather boa would prefer to be exposed to. Wait, _boa_ – now what does that remind me of? Other than the constriction of blood vessels when one tugs a tad too hard during the throes of self…

Ah yes, _Python_! And the parody! Personally, I'd prefer a _pair 'o' D's_ to a _parody_, if'n ye get me meanin', but I aint got no choice in the matt'r, do I guv'nor? Eh? Eh? Ahem! Which brings me to the actual point of this Synopsis, and that is to explain briefly what has happened in the parody up to the point in time where we are at present, which is reading a Synopsis in the second book of a parody trilogy, obviously. So, as I alluded to previously, I 'right-clicked' the cursed mouse rather than 'left-clicked' and the wayward computer sent me to this certain site and this parody in particular, et cetera and so on. I was immediately struck by the title _Monty Python's 'Fellowship of the Ring'. _Certainly the grouping seemed incongruous, a rather odd juxtaposition of a ribald British comedy troupe and the revered fantasy novel by J.R.R. Tolkien, but it was the typeface that really caught my eye, and I was troubled by it.

You see, I cordially dislike _Verdana_ typeface, with its bourgeois humanist san-serif lettering. That it was originally designed for the Microsoft Corporation was another strike against it, particularly since my cursed PC has been racking up viruses like it was a computer version of Typhoid Mary. Oh, I am aware that the Verdana typeface offers better legibility on a computer screen, what with its loose letter spacing, wide proportions and clear distinctions between similar letters, but it is so proletarian, so commonplace. How can one write a decent parody with such pedestrian punctuation plodding in plebian platoons across the printed page? If one wishes to offer a farce that better emulates the style of the original, why not use an uncial typeface like the one that graced the cover of many Lord of the Ring editions, or such a letter design that appeared above the Hollin Gate of Moria? In fact, I would suggest using the Tengwar script for the entire parody. I mean, really, if one seeks authenticity, the more illegible the better.

In any case, I certainly hope this brief Synopsis has illumined the path upon which this parody is perambulating. From my perspective as a critic, I expect that one day I may even read it; if, that is, I ever come back to this site. That, however, is highly unlikely as I have violated my parole, and even now there is a warrant out for my arrest on charges of soliciting and disseminating fruit and vegetable pornography, or 'corn porn' as it is known by vegan devotees. Be that as it may, I enjoyed having you, and I hope you've enjoyed being had.

Sincerely,

Clive R.R. Bowels

**EDITORIAL DISCLAIMER:** _Th' proprietors 'o' this here establishment in no way condone the use of fruits and vegetables in acts of an unsav'ry nature, particularly in th' case of unripened produce, which is expressly prohibited, even in th' case of Middle-earth parodies, by international conventions. This ban includes, but aint limited to, corn-porn, banana-bummin', pomegranate-penetration, pear-polishin', yam-rammin' and Coitus Bacchus, otherwise known as grape-rape. _


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: The Rally of Rohan**

Having unceremoniously dumped the body of Boromir over the falls in the last chapter of Book One, the Three Hunters gained precious time in catching up with the Orkish raiding party that had hobnapped Merry and Pippin.

"We would have wasted at least a half-a-day reciting elegies and epitaphs for the late, unlamented Boromir!" Aragorn shouted with satisfaction as he effortlessly followed the trail left by the lumbering Orcs. "Look, these fewmets are still fresh!"

Gimli picked up a handful of the fewmets, put them eagerly to his nose and then grimaced in disgust. "¡Ay, caramba!" The dwarf gasped. "Theese fewmets, I theenk they smell like sheet!"

"Well, fewmets are feces," Aragorn replied matter-of-factly. "They are droppings which help a hunter identify his prey."

"It's a good thing we didn't step in them then!" Legolas sighed with relief.

But even with the head start afforded them by jettisoning the dour Boromir, the hunters eventually found themselves losing ground.

"Eet seems the further we go, the behinder we get, Aragón!" Gimli panted.

"It is Aragorn," the ranger grumbled, "I'm not from Spain. "But you are right. Some devilry is giving the Orcs speed and slowing us down."

"Pewhaps we should have dumped Gimwi over the fawls awong with Bowomiw," Legolas said with a smirk. "We would have wess dead weight to dwag awong with us now."

"Pendejo maricón!" Gimli hissed.

"Stop it, you two!" Aragorn spat. "You are acting like children of Iluvatar."

By now they had made their way into the realm of Rohan, the verdant, rolling land of revisionist Anglo-Saxon horsemen who would have defeated William the Bastard and his nasty Normans at Hastings if, by Tolkien's Francophobic approximation, King Harold and his housecarls had had a standing cavalry; thus, the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy would have remained in England to subjugate, overtax and generally make miserable the lives of the peasantry, rather than have foreigners do the same more efficiently. In any case, the Three Hunters crested a hill and below them lay a green valley where they espied the first sign of trouble. Hundreds of protesters were milling about carrying placards and signs (most of which had X and O symbols, or spatters of paint mimicking writing, as very few folks were literate at the time). The mob was listening to the exhortations of a rather unkempt demagogue trying to rally the masses with his shrill oratory. Stealthily, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli scrambled down the goat paths that scarred the hillside, and then mingled with the crowd in order to hear what the fuss was all about.

"_A spectre is haunting Dunland," _the shaggy speaker shouted through a megaphone of sheepskin,_ "the spectre of Rohirrism!"_

"Wha's a spectre?" One old gaffer asked a shrewish hag standing next to him.

" 'Ow should I know?" The shrew replied. "Just quit yer yammerin' an' wave yer sign! I've 'eard they'll be 'andin' out prizes for the most enthusiastic demonstra'ors."

"_All the old powers, that of Gondor and Rohan, have entered into an unholy alliance to quench the bright flame of Liberty lit for the Dunlendish people," _the orator bellowed with contempt._ "Where is the party that would oppose these reactionary adversaries?"_

"Yes! Yes! The party!" several oblivious protesters cried. "Where is the party?"

"_To this end, the Executive Administrators of the Council of Propaganda and Pasturage, duly endowed with plenipotentiary powers by the General Secretary for Bureacratic Affairs, were sanctioned to form the first Revolutionary Constitutional Congress of DUFF, the Dunland United Freedom Fighters. And by the gracious invitation of Saruman, both of them gathered at Orthanc and completed a Manifesto!"_

"Wha's a manifesto?" the geezer wheezed. "Is tha' an Eye-talian dish? Sort 'o' like Manicotti, but wi' pesto?

"I should 'ope so," the hag replied, "I'm starvin'!"

"_The history of society has been one of class struggle!"_

"Ye got 'at roight, guv'nor," a shepherd shouted. "I aint ne'er made it past first grade, wha' wi' conjugatin' verbs 'n' danglin' me par'iciple at recess!"

"_Freeman and slave, lord and serf, in other words, oppressor and oppressed, have continually opposed one another in a nearly uninterrupted fight that each time has ended badly for we, the mute masses. There has been no revolutionary reconstitution of society at large for us -- on the contrary, it usually resulted in the utter victory of them what has, as opposed to them what has not. Now Dunland sits alone in chains of degradation; but, at the turn of fortune's wheel, we can become the oppressors and the hated Forgoil of Rohan the oppressed! We can become that which we hate!"_

"This is, like, so-o-o-o boring!" a teenage girl whined.

"Like, we should have _so_ gone to the mall," her BFF chimed in.

"I wish they'd serve the manifesto," the gaffer grumbled. "Me tummy's rumblin'."

"_To that end, we shall join with Saruman the White, our sorcerous friend and benefactor, who has offered us his wizardly assistance in ridding Dunland of the hated horsemasters. Join us now! Join us in this righteous rebellion! We may be casting off one master for another even more tyrannical despot; but he has such a pleasant, fatherly way of making our gullibility seem noble -- almost intelligent. Besides, we shall get a brief glimmer of freedom before our hopes are ruthlessly crushed, which is all we peasants could possibly expect at this juncture in history, given the inadequate means of mass communication only made possible by the printing press, which will not be available, technologically speaking, until the time of Herr Gutenberg. But enough of anachronistic platitudes, what say you, people of Dunland? Shall we fight for freedom, however short-lived?"_

There was a prolonged, dumb silence punctuated by sneezing, rheumy wheezing, lip smacking and tubercular coughs. The speaker sighed in defeat. Despite his best efforts and his Ciceronian dialectical rhetoric, he felt he was losing the mob. And so, as with all demagogues past and present, he decided to plumb the depths and cater to the crowd's basest emotions. _"Of course, there will be other benefits…"_ he said with a polished smile.

"Wha' benefits?" the old hag shouted.

"Yes, yes, what's in it for me?" A one-eyed, legless beggar cried as he shifted nervously on his stumps. "Please, I can't stand the suspense!"

"And when do we get our manifesto?" the grizzled geezer grumped. "Will it be at th' party you was mentionin' earlier?"

…"_There will be rape and pillage." _

And there was a great cheer that arose from the throng, and they immediately fell into beating each other with cudgels, staffs and canes.

"_NO, NO, NO!"_ the orator shrieked through his megaphone_. "I was referring to raping and pillaging the people of Rohan!"_

"O-o-o-oh!" the bloodied crowd cried in unison and stopped their infighting, except for one stout shepherd who punched the shrewish hag again for good measure.

"_Now, I want the folks to my left to start right in on the raping, and the ones on my right to go off and pillage."_

"Well, why can't we just do both?" the shepherd shouted in dismay, his staff clinched tightly in his left hand and his other staff now gripped firmly in his right.

The speaker gave the suggestion some thought and then finally shrugged. _"Sure, why not!"_

The mob screamed in a blood-curdling frenzy and scattered off in all directions to practice their raping and pillaging skills, leaving the Three Hunters alone in the valley.

"This can't be good," Aragorn said.

"Aye, and I'm afwaid the mob twampled any sign of the Owcs' passing!" Legolas replied.

"Well, señores, I theenk that rapin' and peellagin' sounds muy bueno," Gimli said in afterthought. "Why don' we jus' take a siesta from thees here questo, an' jes' steal us some gold on de way. Mebbe we can have our way with some sexy muchachas too, eh?"

Aragorn gave Gimli a curious, sidelong glance as if he were momentarily entertaining the dwarf's idea, but then he forcibly shook himself to his senses. "No!" he stated gruffly. "That would be no way for the heroes in this epic to behave."

"Heroes, schmeroes," Gimli shrugged. "Why for do th' banditos always get de fun?"

"From the standpoint of the authow's awdent Cathowicity, it is just the cwoss we have to beaw, metaphowicawy speaking" Legolas replied virtuously.

"Pffft!" Gimli spat. "As eef de fairies would know fun, even eef it heet them en la cabeza!"

Aragorn, for his part, ignored his two comrade's constant bickering and set to work on picking up the Orc's stale trail. Traversing all the way to the far end of the valley, he suddenly made a discovery. Calling his fellow hunters to his side, Aragorn wiped the sweat from his brow and said, "Having taxed my senses to the utmost and using every bit of tracking experience I have garnered over many decades as a Ranger, I have once again found the Orkish trail!"

Gimli and Legolas looked to where Aragorn pointed and saw five dead Orcs, and beyond the mangled corpses a wide swath of trampled, bloody grass leading out of the valley.

"Amazing twacking abiwity!" Legolas said snarkily as he shot a glance to Gimli, who rolled his eyes and shrugged.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three: I know I've only just met you, but here, take my prized horses**

Good evening, my name is John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. My friends call me 'Tollers', but you may call me Professor Tolkien -- neither _Tolkine_ nor _Tolkeen_, mind you, but _Tolkien_. It is with much chagrin that I am come from the far Stygian shore to offer my profuse and sincere apologies to one Karl Heinrich Marx for the manner in which his _Communist Manifesto_ was mocked and belittled in Chapter Two of this parody. On a personal level, I have for decades dealt with so-called 'fan-fiction' writers impudently appropriating my own works, and I have become quite inured to the banal maundering of uninspired hacks plundering my novels. These 'fan-fictionalists' either lack the wherewithal to create anything original, or have associated themselves far too closely with my works and thus have acquired an unhealthy attachment to Middle-earth. The word _fan_ is, after all, merely a popularized contraction of the more ominous _fanatic_. But, as I am deceased, there is little reason to get agitated at this point; Herr Marx, however, is German – a stodgy Prussian at that -- and, as you well know, being dead has little relevance in points of honor for one of the _Alemannic_ race. In addition, poor Karl has very little practical experience in either fan-fiction or farcical revisions of his works, and has been in such a state since the publication of Chapter Two that none of us in the Afterlife are getting much rest.

Of course, it hasn't helped that Marx has been bunking for the last century or so with Theodore Roosevelt and Friedrich Nietzsche. Teddy insists on teasing him, referring to him as a 'wooly anarchist', and Freddy hums _Also Sprach Zarathustra _at all hours of the night; therefore, Karl has become quite high strung over time. We were at tea the afternoon last and Marx was ranting in near-unintelligible _Deutsch_ regarding this latest literary depredation, when Bertie Einstein smiled gently and said, "Relax, Karl, it is all relative." Naturally, we found this to be devilishly witty, to the point that Sam Clemens shot milk through his nose; but Marx fell into a rage and began using profane language that was highly inappropriate, given our ethereal surroundings. Needless to say, the Angel Gabriel gave Karl a time-out. This metaphysical form of discipline did nothing to improve the demeaned Marx's demeanor; on the contrary, he began accusing the seraphim of being papists and the cherubim of harboring bourgeois pretensions. He was divinely ordered to attend an anger-management session led by Gautama Buddha and Mother Theresa, but to little effect, in part because Oscar Wilde said he found Karl's beard incredibly sexy – in a beastly, proletarian manner -- much like that of the bristling Van Gogh. Shakespeare then made a joke about lending Vincent an ear, and the session descended into bedlam.

Oh dear, it seems that I have been rambling. This, I suppose, comes from no longer having any conception of time, as well as being freed from the mean constraints of publishing deadlines, which I have always cordially detested. Be that as it may, we will dearly miss you up here, Herr Marx. I am sure that your current infernal accommodations among the fascists and despots will do little to assuage your sour disposition, but look at the bright side: perhaps you can tutor your wayward protégés, Stalin and Chairman Mao, in the fundamentals of your doctrine. It would seem they somehow missed the point, an all too common occurrence among followers, I am afraid. As for myself, I have had to contend with an annoyingly ubiquitous Mary-Sue person who seems to have found her way into every facet of my sub-created world. What a miserable bitch! Garn, I am sure that last crack will cost me ten _Hail Mary's_ and ten _Our Father's_; either that, or they will force me to reread _The Chronicles of Narnia_ as an allegorical penance. They have always disliked the subsumed nature of my Christian symbology up here; everything has to be so damned apocalyptically overt!

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

Having regained the Orkish trail, the Three Hunters descended from the hills and made their way out onto the gently undulating meadows of Rohan. In the far distance, the ocularly acute Legolas espied a great burning that, not surprisingly, paralleled the present path they were taking. They hurriedly chased the pyric plume of billowing smoke westward, all the while deeply concerned with their vulnerable position on the open plain. As they were debating the relative pros and cons of indecent exposure versus the need for speed, the dilemma manifested itself in the thunderous pounding of hoofbeats. So, as great heroes of any legendary epic would naturally do, they simply sat down and awaited their uncertain fate.

At this point, Tolkien gives a rather long-winded description of the Riders of Rohan that borders on the verge of man-love. I mean, I appreciate the use of kennings in the depiction, as the Rohirrim were obviously preux Beowulfian chevaliers (if I may mix Anglo-Saxon and French metaphors): fell and fair, long-limbed, flaxen-pale, tall spears, long swords, et cetera; but please, use some restraint, Professor!

"What news, Riders of Rohan?" Aragorn shouted, interrupting any further critical narration.

At this, the equestrians abruptly wheeled about as if they were a rack on a pinion, completing their rotation in a masterly, fluid motion. In another moment, the Three Hunters were themselves at bay, with a hedgehog-like phalanx of spears surrounding them. The lead horseman, a fell looking fellow with a plume of horsehair cascading from his dread helm, rode forward and pointed the tip of his spear within an inch of Aragorn's nose.

"Hwæt eart þū?" The man growled. "Hwider þū gecymst ēow fram?"

"Mīn nama is Aragorn," the Ranger replied fearlessly. "Hwæt wilt þū, lēasere?"

The man of Rohan did not like to have his questions thrown back at him, nor did he like being called a fool. "Gehlystan, frēond, mē lēfre wǣre ofslēan ēow nū ðonne mǣlan!"

Although Gimli could not understand a word of the faux-Mercian dialogue, by the inflection in the horseman's voice he could tell things were going ill. So, in his best Irish brogue, he said, "Sure'n 'twould be a might better if ye lay off yer heathen blather and speak like daycent Christian boyos, eh? Ye sound like twa idjets bickerin' o'er the price of a turban, fer Chrissakes!"

The rider leapt lightly from his steed. Drawing his sword, the man drew close to Aragorn and looked him up and down contemptuously. "Judging by the smell, I had thought you were Orcs," the man hissed in Westron, the lingua franca of the time. He glanced over at Gimli and added, "But on closer inspection, it was obviously the odor of Dwarves."

Gimli scowled at the rider, but remained silent.

"But aside from the stench," the man continued, "how did you escape the sight of my riders? Are you some type of mushroom-folk, sprung from horse dung beneath our hooves?"

No, there are not any Hobbits among us," Aragorn replied. "One of us is an Elf, Legolas of Mirkwood, and you've already met Gimli the Dwarf. As I said previously, I am Aragorn, a ranger from the North."

"Strange bedfellows, to be sure," the man smirked. "As for me, I am Éomer son of Éomund, the Third Marshal of the Riddermark."

"Ho-ho! Naught but third, eh?" Gimli laughed scornfully. "And it may be a wee better if we spent our time conversin' with a bloke further up th' food chain."

Éomer's eyes burned angrily. "I would cut off your head, if it were just a bit higher from the ground. How are your jumping skills?"

"Way off the wittle fewwow, you Wohiwwim wascal," Legolas cried as he drew his bow in a blink of an eye. "I wiw sway you befowe you can say Wumpewstiwskin!"

Éomer opened his mouth to speak, but merely mouthed the word 'Wumpewstiwskin' silently. Coming to his senses, Éomer raised his sword and things were looking mighty bleak, if it weren't for one those insipid commercial breaks that make the television medium such an annoying viewing experience.

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

_Hello, I am Leonard Elendilstein from the law firm of Elrosky, Isilduritz and Elendilstein. Have you or someone in your family been ravaged by Orcs? Do you have lingering fear from an encounter with the Nazgul? Since the Second Age, our law firm has put our team of highly qualified trial lawyers, archers and pikemen to work on behalf of traumatized Gondorians throughout the greater Minas Tirith metropolitan area. Now, we are pleased to announce the opening of a second office in Dol Amroth specializing in Corsair plundering and piratical acts!_

_Don't feel intimidated by the Great Eye! If we can't win your case, we'll kill the Orcs for you. Remember, we are only a Ring away at 1-800-SUE-MORDOR._

_If an Orc has ate your Aunt Lenore,_  
_Call the bad-ass Jews at SUE-MORDOR!***_

_*****Editorial Disclaimer:**__ Any depiction of Jews as stereotypical, lawsuit-hungry attorneys is strictly coincidental. In addition, just because murderous, terrorist Orcs appear riding camels and are attired in ogals, shumags and dishdashah does not mean they are of Islamic extraction. Neither does the Nazgul wearing the traditional red cross on a white tabard of the Templars indicate they were the vicious Christian Crusaders who mercilessly slew all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, including women and children, until they were knee-high in their victims' blood. Finally, background shots of men dressed in Kurta-pyjamas chanting Vedic verses while tossing live widows on funeral pyres should in no way be construed as being Hindu. _

_We here at __**The Insult Channel**__ strive to mock, defame, slander, trivialize, blaspheme and otherwise ridicule as many people as humanly possible, but due to programming time limitations and the lack of advertisers, we cannot include everyone all the time. If you feel that your specific race, creed, nationality or religion has not been properly insulted, just drop us a line. __**The Insult Channel**__ will tailor a programme designed specifically for your miserable, smelly, wantonly slutty group of cretins. __**T.I.C. – It's What Makes Us TICK!**_

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

Unfortunately, the inordinately long Editorial Disclaimer had eaten up most of the time originally devoted to the extensive (some would say tedious) dialogue between Éomer, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli.

"Then you need…you need…ummm…you need not pursue them any longer," Éomer said frantically as he paged forward through the script. "The Orcs are all dead."

"But did ye see nothin' 'o' the l'il Hobbits, then?" Gimli O'Gloin cried. "No more than wee leprechauns would they appear to be."

"I have seen naught of Hobbits, leprechauns or any other diminutive fairytale creatures," Éomer stated firmly. "Nothing but Orcs."

"Time's a' wasting, m'lord," a rider said to Éomer, completely ignoring the three obvious lunatics. "Let's kill these wildmen now, or bind them and drag their sorry arses off to Edoras."

"Hold your tongue, Æðelbert," Éomer shouted in his own tongue (which the narrator is too lazy to offer in its original form), "Go tell Hengist and Horsa to ready the men at the rendezvous point. I shall meet you there presently."

Æðelbert walked off grumbling, leaving Éomer alone with the Three Hunters. "And so, what will you do now, Aragorn son of Arathorn?" Éomer asked. "We could use the Heir of Elendil's sword in Edoras. For Théoden King is a bit…ummm…off these days."

"A bit off?" Aragorn said.

"Well," Éomer sighed, "let's just say that Théoden is several horses short of a herd. More of a sack than a Saxon. Less sharp Angle and more squiggly line…"

"I get what you're saying," Aragorn interrupted. "We shall come as we may, Éomer son of Éomund. But I cannot abandon my friends as long as hope, however slight, remains to us."

"Abandon all hope, ye who enter here," Éomer said, briefly channeling Dante. "Anyway, here are two horses for your use. They are of the Ranyhyn, the great steeds honored by the Ramen and ridden by the Bloodguard…" Éomer paused and blushed in embarrassment, suddenly realizing he had been referring to the horses in _The Chronicles of Thomas Convenant_. "In any case, take them. May they serve you better than they did the dead guys who rode them previously."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: Half-breed Orcs with Hybrid Sporks – **

**The Compleat Guide to Uruk-hai Cannibalistic Etiquette**

**-OR-**

**There's them what eats, and them what gets et**

Having been dragged about for several days by his Orkish captors, Pippin, who had once despised the foul creatures, now gained a grudging respect for the Orcs. Certainly, they were bloodthirsty savages, and he and Merry were most likely going to end up spitted and roasted as hobbit-kabobs; but Pippin began to admire the Orcs' stamina, their brute strength and their devil-may-care attitude. Orkish wit, unsubtle and often cruel, had a Benny Hill-like sense of the absurd – over-the-top yet ironic – which gave their blunt speech a certain biting lilt, and a colorful turn of a phrase in nearly every gruff pronouncement. There was a brash nobility in Orcs that James Fenimore Cooper would have appreciated.

"Pippin," Merry whispered as their Orkish guards stepped away for supper.

"What, Merry?" Pippin muttered irritably, annoyed that his fellow Hobbit hostage had interrupted his Orkish reverie.

"Stockholm Syndrome," was all that Merry said.

"What?"

"You've got Stockholm Syndrome, a psychological reaction sometimes seen in hostages, particularly weak-minded ones, in which the hostage shows signs of loyalty or sympathy towards his abductor."

"I am sure I don't know what you are talking about," Pippin huffed.

"Admiration? Brash nobility? Colorful turn of a phrase? James Fenimore Cooper?"

"I think the Uruk they call Lugdush likes me. He hasn't kicked me at all today."

"Will you listen to yourself?" Merry grimaced. "It sounds like you have a crush on him!"

Pippin blushed. "Oh, it's nothing like that. A crush, on an Orc? That's silly. Still…he does have dreamy black eyes. They glint darkly when he grunts."

"Pippin, every Orc has black eyes -- they're always dark!"

"Shut yer traps, Shire-maggots!" the Uruk-hai leader named Uglúk growled. "Save yer pipsqueakin' for Isengard. You'll wish you had no tongues then!"

"About Isengard," Grishnákh, the classically trained Orc of the Dark Tower, sneered,

"_Methinks thou hast an error made  
__Lugburz is where we should now fly_  
_A Nazgul waits upon the shore_  
_For news to bring before the Eye."_  


"Nazgul?" Uglúk spat. "And give up our prize so you can get all the glory in Mordor? No!" The Uruk turned a contemplative gaze towards distant Orthanc and said:

"_My duty lies in Isengard,_  
_Of that command, I will not shirk._  
_Be damned, you apish Mordor rat,_  
_And damn your precious Nazgul jerk!"_

Grishnákh clenched his fangs and hissed an Orkish curse. He hadn't expected the doltish Isengarder to reply in iambic tetrameter:

"_Now watch your words, you wizard's pawn!_  
_The Nazgul rate in Mordor high._  
_If I were you, I'd shut my mouth,_  
_They are the apples of the Eye!"_

Unwilling to have his dauntless captain spoken to in such a rude manner, the noble Lugdush stepped forward, his dark eyes glinting angrily:

"_Spew not your treason, Orkish spawn_  
_To Isengard we plight our troth_  
_Uglúk our captain leads the way_  
_His face will grace yon Gorgoroth!"_

"You're doing it again!" Merry cried, no longer concerned with the consequences.

"What?" Pippin shrugged.

"You're having the Orcs recite verse like they were William Blake or Christopher Marlowe!"

"I am that iamb," Pippin muttered dreamily.

Before the Orcs could properly punish the Hobbits for their literary repartee, a warning cry came from a snaga scout who had just returned from patrol. "The filthy horse boys have spotted us!" he gasped as he made his way to Uglúk.

"Spotted _us_?" Uglúk bellowed dubiously. "Spotted _you_, you mean! Just what happened, snaga?"

"Well, I were squattin' down against a tree…relievin' meself," the snaga said in embarrassment, "and I were just hummin' some Bizet -- you know 'ow I love arias -- and I…ummm…got a bit carried away."

"Carried away?" Uglúk growled.

"Well, I were at the part where Carmen lays dyin'…"

"Oh, that part's so sad!" Lugdush groaned.

"…and I starts up singin' the _Toreador Song_ quite loud."

"Tha' is a loverly chorus," Uglúk said, wiping a tear from his eye. "Go on, go on -- what happened next?"

"Then, one 'o' them stinkin' whiteskins on a horse hears me and starts a' chasin' me 'cross the plain."

"Them horse boys never did like decent opera," Lugdush grumbled. "For them, it's always Wagner with 'is pompous Germanic themes!"

"How ironic that _l'opéra-comique_ should prove to be our undoin'!" Uglúk sighed reflectively. "Well, there's nothin' for it now, boys!" Uglúk shouted. "We've got to make for the forest yonder. Then, it's every Orc for hisself!"

And the Orkish horde raced with great speed towards the dark woods, even as the distant rumble of the Rohirrim cavalry drew ever nearer with each pounding hoof beat. The Orcs proved amazingly quick on their feet, particularly after such a grueling march from the Anduin, but the Riders of Rohan were faster still, soon hemming the Orcs in a vast circle hard against the verge of the forest. A bloody battle was imminent, and the brutally bound Hobbits quaked in fear as they lay helpless on the ground. After all, there was little chance the Rohirrim could differentiate between Orc and Hobbit in the ensuing slaughter.

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

BBC War Correspondent Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque here in lovely Lothlórien, a land laden with golden-leaved mallorn and just oozing with Elvish appeal. We are here to interview that supportive man behind a stronger woman, the Prince-consort Albert to Queen Victoria, the cuckolded Lord of Lórien, Celeborn.

**Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque:** Good evening, Lord Celeborn.

**Lord Celeborn:** First of all, it's Kele-born, not Sele-born. Use a hard 'c' sound as in cat.

**BURP:** Right, Kele-born. Now, I must first ask, what's up with the silver hair? I thought Elves were immortal – immune to the aging process.

**LC:** Well, it's more of a personal affectation, really. It gives me the look of a sage elder, don't you think?

**BURP:** No, not really. But I compliment your colorist -- you can hardly see the roots. Lord Celeborn, in reading your bio, it seems your ancestry is uncertain. In one story, you are a Telerin Elf of Valinor, and then there is the more widely publicized version, that of a Sindarin Elf of Doriath. Which is it?

**LC:** Give no credence to the Telerin Elf story.

**BURP:** The one in which they name you _Teleporno_?

**LC:** Yes…the…Teleporno…one.

**BURP:** Interesting name, that.

**LC:** Yes…right…interesting.

**BURP:** All sorts of intriguing connotations can be attached to that name.

**LC:** Yes…connotations.

**BURP:** One can well understand why an Elf would change his name and invent an entirely new back-story for himself…

**LC:** Well, you are mistaken about that…

**BURP:** Come to think of it, why would a Noldorin lady the stature of Galadriel, the greatest living Elf in Middle-earth, a peer of the renowned Fëanor, associate herself with a nobody…

**LC: **I don't care for where this is heading…

**BURP:** …an Elf with no celebrity relations, no glorious war record to speak of…

**LC:** Hey! I'm a kinsman of Thingol, king of Doriath.

**BURP:** Yes, according to the current, widely distributed version of the story. But Thingol is dead, and so are all of his immediate relatives. And Menegroth was burnt to the ground…

**LC:** Just what are you getting at?

**BURP:** That there are no records left which prove conclusively that you are from Doriath. And I just can't fathom what Galadriel sees in you. Unless…

**LC:** Unless…what?

**BURP:** Unless…let's get back to the Teleporno name, shall we?

**LC:** I'd rather we didn't.

**BURP:** Very interesting name…

**LC:** Yes, you've said that already.

**BURP:** I can't help but think that, with a name like Teleporno, you are endowed with certain abilities. It's as if Teleporno is more a title than an actual name.

**LC:** Stop right there…

**BURP:** I mean, really, what does Galadriel need you for? She's seems quite capable of ruling without you. You must serve some purpose…

**LC:** All right! All right! It's true, all true! They called me Teleporno in Valinor because…

**BURP:** Because?

**LC:** I…I got around. Amateur hardcore films produced by Morgoth, mostly.

**BURP:** Using Fëanor's Palantiri, I suppose?

**LC:** Yes. Back then, the term 'seeing stones' was used in a quite literal sense.

**BURP:** And your relationship with Galadriel?

**LC:** I...I...ummm...

**BURP:** Come on, out with it!

**LC:** I am her _boy-toy_, okay? Is that what you want to hear? Huh? Damned meddling reporter! All right, I admit it: _I AM GALADRIEL'S BITCH!_

*Sobs uncontrollably*

**BURP: **War Correspondent Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque here in Lothlórien with another stunning Elvish revelation brought to you exclusively by _BBC Middle-earth_.

**LC: ***Still sniveling* Look, you won't tell Elrond, will you? I could lose my spot on the White Council!

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

The attack of the Rohirrim was swift and devastating. The Orcs formed themselves in tight knots of fighters in order to contend with the huge warhorses that could trample them singly. But the Riders of Rohan were masters of bow and arrow and spear, which they wielded as well on horseback as they did with both feet on the ground. Many Orcs fell beneath the withering hail unleashed by the Rohirrim as the deadly cordon grew tighter about them. At this point in time, Merry and Pippin found themselves abandoned by their guards, who were forced to join in the desperate fight.

"Let's see if we can crawl to the forest," Pippin said.

"I can't, I am all bound up," Merry replied.

"Well, a little constipation shouldn't be that much of a hindrance."

"The ropes, you idiot! I cannot move!"

Before Pippin could reply, Grishnákh, the evilly disposed but eloquent Orc from Lugburz, grabbed the Hobbits in his crushing, clawing grip and, through the confused mayhem of the battle, managed to sneak beyond the fell ring of Rohirrim that was collapsing in on the doomed Orcs. Once outside the circle of death, Grishnákh set the Hobbits down and began pawing at them as if he were searching for something.

"Hey, I believe he's feeling me up!" Pippin cried in dismay.

"Well, you're the one with the Orkish puppy-love," Merry mocked.

But Pippin was quicker to catch on than his Hobbitish friend. It seemed perhaps that Grishnákh knew that a Hobbit carried the One Ring, and that's why the Nazgul was so interested in them being sent to Mordor and not Isengard!

"Gollum, Gollum!" Pippin gurgled in the back of his throat.

Grishnákh hands stopped pawing and his eye twitched. "What did you just say?" the Orc growled.

"Gollum!" Pippin replied.

Merry looked with some concern at his friend and said, "Pip, are you catching a cold?"

Pippin rolled his eyes. "Merry, the nice Orcsy here wants to play gamsies with us. It likes riddles, p'raps?"

Grishnákh licked his lips and smirked shrewdly. "Ah, so that's it, is it?

"Yes, my precious," Pippin said, "but you won't find what you are seeking so easily. Maybe we can strike a deal."

"A deal?" Grishnákh grumbled. "What kind of deal?"

"Just this," Pippin said matter-of-factly, "we'll give you what you want, and you let us go. Simple. Elegant. No articles or addenda, no clauses in small print and no hidden destination charges."

Sometimes Hobbits talk too much, and this was just such instance. By being cute and including superfluous add-ons to his offer, the Hobbit had given the Orc time to think. "Here's a deal for you," Grishnákh sneered, "why don't I just kill you and find the Ring in my own good time?"

"No…no, that won't work at all," Pippin stuttered fearfully. "You see, that's not much of deal for us. I was thinking more of a give and take, bargainy kind of a deal..."

Suddenly, a spear flew from the darkness and skewered Grishnákh. The Orc shrieked and fell forward on top of the Hobbits.

"…or, you could just simply die," Pippin grunted as he tried to push Grishnákh's dead body off he and Merry. "In which case, all deals are off."


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five: If an Ent falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, would that Ent then be on the Huorns of a Dilemma?**

Aside from the abovementioned metaphorical musing of Irish philosopher George Berkeley -- married awkwardly as it is to a rhetorical pun -- it is time _to haul in one's huorn,_ an additional colloquial pun (as well as a side aside unto itself), and wonder aloud whether a horn made of huorn would be thorny or indeed horny, but not in the sense of a _cuckold's horn_, which involves a different horniness and diverges from the subject of huorns altogether, principally because they had become 'treeish' and abandoned the Ent-wives centuries ago, thus precluding the consummation of marital cross-pollination; however, one cannot totally disallow the concept of huorn horniness as Tolkien does mention the huorns' arousal, but perhaps the use of the word 'aroused' in this sense is more akin to the variant 'roused' as in being awakened; on the other hand, men often wake up with 'morning wood', and since huorns are also erect (approximating trees in the fashion of _Macbeth's_ Malcolm in Birnam Woods), they may well have exhibited morning wood, then afternoon wood, then evening wood, as the day waxed and waned, which is an apt metaphor for arousal, consummation and afterglow…

"How long do you think the narrator can keep up this nonsense?" Pippin groaned.

"I believe he is merely reenacting Treebeard's sonorous soliloquies of prolix palaver -- practice for later on this chapter," Merry yawned literarily.

"Who is Treebeard?" Pippin asked.

Merry sighed. He hated the whole idea of narrative intervention in the plot, particularly since he had no idea who Treebeard was either. But they had survived the rambling prologue of this chapter, and also their harrowing abduction and escape from the Orcs, in spite of their innate Hobbitish obtuseness and due in large part to the ubiquitous blind luck that is rife for half-pint, hairy-toed urchins in this veritable Age of 'Umble 'Obbits. Blundering through the tumbling brakes of weedy bracken on the eaves of moss-bearded and bedraggled Fangorn, the two Hobbits followed a clear running stream, the Entwash, with no particular notion of where they were heading or what they would do with their newfound freedom. At least they had no further fear of Orcs, as the fell whoop and cry of the battle faded the farther they fumbled through the forest.

"Did you notice that each forest in Middle-earth has its own distinctive character, Merry?" Pippin panted, finding it harder and harder to breath in Fangorn's oppressive atmosphere. "It's almost as if…each has an individual personality."

"Whatever do you mean?" Merry huffed as he struggled through the morass of hanging moss that shrouded the banks of the stream.

"Well, Lothlórien was light and airy, like a fairy," Pippin waxed poetic, "and before that, the Old Forest was certainly easier on the eyes – a bit more orderly and Bombadilified -- if you get my meaning."

"Aye, I see where you're coming from," Merry nodded. "And I seem to recall Bilbo saying that Mirkwood was near pitch black and full of evil intent. But I don't sense that in this wood. It's just a hot mess."

"You got that right," Pippin laughed. "The landscape here is right out of _Ye Olde Wolds and Hanging Gardens."_

"Wait, isn't a _wold_ a hilly or rolling region of open field?" Merry corrected.

Pippin sniffed indignantly. "I was referring to the definition of _wold_ in an Old English sense, _weald, _akin to Old High German _wald_ or forest. Fangorn is a forested upland as inferred in Old English, not the odd convolution of meaning found in Middle-English, with its Frankish obliteration of West Saxon, which parallels the deforestation of England at the hands of the Normans."

"My, this is a cranky old wold then," Merry chuckled as the peevish Pippin suddenly put on airs, "downright ancient. What with the trees teepeed in mummy wrappings and the moss and molds all musty-smelling like the Old Gaffer before his yearly bath."

Pippin shuddered and turned up his nose. "Now, that's a memory of the Shire I could live without," he said in disgust. "But I'd sit next to Gaffer Gamgee and tip a pint -- even right before his annual dowsing -- if I could be back home. Reek and all, it'd be better than this decrepit spot."

"Decrepit?" A deep voice rumbled from behind them. "Hrrroommmmm…perhaps I have neglected spring cleaning for the past three or four centuries, mmm-but I think it has given the place a rather cozy…hrmmmm…lived in look. I mean, really, one cannot truly decorate with any formality given all the squirrel droppings piled about. "

With sideways glances, Merry and Pippin caught each other's sinking expressions. Slowly turning, they beheld an immense man…tree…tree-man: he was fourteen feet tall, covered from ankles to apex with a shaggy layer of bark (in more pliable areas brown skin), rootishly gnarled feet and toes, a great bole for a belly, a mottled beard of mangy moss and a bushy bough of leaves as his lofty helm. In a terrible burst of speed, he swept up the frightened Hobbits in his two broad, branchlike arms, and eyed them suspiciously.

"Damnable Orcs," he grumbled, "they're like termites. You only actually find two, but then there is a whole hidden army of them gnawing holes in your rafters. Hmmmm…I will have to get the whole forest fumigated now. I can just imagine the bill for that bit of work!"

"We…we're not Orcs, your…your Hickoryness?" Pippin stuttered. "We are Hobbits. Hobbits from the Shire."

"Hrooom-hom!" the tree-man bellowed. "You certainly smell like Orc – you have got their foul stench all over you!"

"We…we were captives of Orcs," Merry cried, "and one of them was feeling us up!"

The tree-man raised a twiggish eyebrow. "Orcs… and sluttish ones at that, hmmmm? If there is nothing worse than an Orc it is an Uruk-whore – those cursed _ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ays_!"

"No, no, no! You don't understand, your Oakship," Pippin squeaked. "The Orc…he was looking to get something…and…and not what you think!"

"Well, you are not very attractive whores, to be sure," he said after some consideration, "mmm-but then, it would not take much to turn on an Orc, would it?"

"Please, your Maplesty," Pippin continued with a bit more bravado, "I am telling you, we are Hobbits, not Orcs. We live in Hobbit-holes in a land up north called the Shire…"

"And we have elevensies, nuncheons and afternoon tea!" Merry added, hoping the Hobbits' meal itinerary separated them from the less diligent Orcs, whose table etiquette was questionable, to say the least. Besides, having only eaten lembas the past two days, he had gotten quite hungry, and the thought of eating had overridden any other consideration.

"Hmmmmmmmmmmm…" the tree-man drawled for an inordinately long time, "Maybe you aren't Orcs…but you still could be whores."

"We aren't whores!" Pippin cried.

"No, we've never charged anyone!" Merry agreed, then blushed when he realized that his comment might be misconstrued.

"Well, if anything, you are very odd creatures," the tree-man said, "very odd indeed. Root and shoot, just plain odd! What Eru was thinking when he spawned your species, I will never know."

"And…and who…what…are you, if I may ask?" Pippin said.

"Who am I? What am I? Well, that is rather an impertinent question, coming from a whore. But if you must know, I am an Ent. An Ent is what I am. Aint nothing but an Ent. Some call me Fangorn, but you may call me Treebeard."

"Again with the multiple naming convention," Merry muttered.

"Ummm…what exactly is an Ent, and what do they eat?" Pippin asked. By this time, he was no longer scared; on the contrary, he was now bored and hungry.

"Hrmmmm-hoom!" Treebeard boomed. "What hasty folks! Although, judging by your small size I assume you have a much higher metabolism – like mice or rabbits or even moths – and therefore your hastiness is understandable. But I will be asking the questions here; we are in my land, after all!" Treebeard studied the Hobbits carefully. He had considered adding them to his butterfly collection, but his killing jar was much too small for such a task. He wondered if simply mounting them to a display board with insect pins would do the trick; but he must find out more about these strange creatures first. "You odd folk do not seem to come up on any of the old lists," Treebeard finally said, "but my _Enternational Ardagraphic_ subscription expired ages ago. Let me see here, how did that go again?"

"I feel a song coming on," Pippin whispered glumly.

"Just humor him," Merry sighed. "We're in no position to be critical."

_Living creatures, learn their lore!_  
_First, the Free Peoples, races four:_  
_Elves, the dainty, all coiffures and boudoirs;_  
_Dwarves, the stinky, in need of a shower;_  
_Ents, the shepherds, in their woody halls;_  
_Man, the shopper, builder of malls._

"Hrmmmm, hooom,"

_Pigs are bacon, cows are beef_  
_Sheep is lamb wrapped in grape leaf._  
_Hare in a stew, Pheasant under glass,_  
_Chickens are capon, goose are foie gras._

"Awkward rhyme scheme," Pippin hissed.

"I know," Merry replied, "but it's making me hungry."

_A bazaar of guillemots, a mob of emus,_  
_A horde of gerbils, an implausibility of gnus,_  
_A bloat of Hippopotami, a pace of asses,_  
_A cackle of hyenas, a shoal of basses…_

"Hooom-hom, hom-hrooom, how did that go again? _Tikki tikki tembo-no sa rembo-chari bari ruchi-pip peri pembo_. Bless my unlichenized polypore fungus! I seem to have forgot the gist of the list, you might say. But it does not seem you funny folk fit anywhere. Therefore, I shall add a new line:

_Half-ass Hobbits, the whore-fellows._

Pippin frowned. "How about: _Half-grown Hobbits, the hole-dwellers_?"

"_Whore-fellows, hole-dwellers_…I don't see much of a difference," Treebeard shrugged.

"But we live in holes," Merry explained. "Not nasty, dirty, wet holes, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet dry, bare, sandy holes with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: they are hobbit-holes, and that means comfort."

"Hrmmmmm, that sounds familiar," Treebeard hummed. "Now where have I heard that before?"

"Oh, we get around," Pippin winked.

"Do you now?" Treebeard said with great curiosity. "Hrooom-hoom-hom, you haven't seen the Ent-wives, have you?"

"Ummmm…no, I mean, I don't believe so," Merry said. "What are Ent-wives, exactly?"

"Hrmmmm, it is a very,very long and very, very sad story…" Treebeard moaned.

"Well, maybe some other time, then," Pippin interrupted, more interested in supper than a story.

"…mmm-but it will take a l-o-o-o-n-g time in the telling…"

"Really, that won't be necessary…ummm…given the pain it might cause you."

"…you Hobbit-folk may well be dead by the time it is finished…"

"Time – yes, would you look at the time! I'm afraid we really should be going."

"…It all started ages upon ages upon ages upon ages ago…"

"Oh, good lord!"

"…It is really quite lovely sung in Old Entish, which is a very melodious language, and definitely not hasty. The article 'the' in Old Entish is over 500 letters long…"

"Is it? My, that is fascinating. But really, isn't there a Cliff Notes version?"

"…But perhaps I should dispense with the original Old Entish and offer a more modern, updated version. We Ents can be real hep-cats when we are aroused!"

"Oh brother…"

"As a matter of fact, I shall sing it for you now…"

"I hate my life!"

But fortunately for Pippin, the narrator had nearly hit the 2000 word goal he had set for this chapter, and peremptorily cut Treebeard's _Song of the Ent-wives_.

"There is a god!"

Well, perhaps not a god per se, but an omniscient narrator dabbling in the sub-creative recesses of speculative fiction, or, more to the point, assembling disparate literary allusions, sly word puns, satiric songs and cleverly contrived cultural touchstones, and rhapsodizing the rambling randomness within the netherworldly bounds of a much-beloved fantasy novel, creating an epic parody of such grand proportions…

"Please, not you too!" Pippin cried in anguish.

I was just kidding. I just needed a few more sentences to reach my objective. We can finish anytime now.

"Can we eat first?"

"Merry!"

"Oh, sorry Pippin."


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six: A Moot Point **

When last we left Merry and Pippin, they had been saved from the ruthless verbosity of Treebeard, who had meant to root out the Hobbits with singing – and in the cruel strains of Old Entish, no less! Fortunately, that dire threat was stemmed when the meddlesome narrator nipped Treebeard's urge to sing in the bud, thus proving the Ent's bark was worse than his bite. Like all arboreal manifestations, Treebeard would eventually bough to atmospheric pressure. In any case, since Treebeard had agreed, provisionally at least, that the Halflings were indeed Hobbits and not Orcs, and that Merry and Pippin were not whores but just morally lax, the old Ent finally took the young Hobbits into his confidence.

"Hroooom, Hooom-hom!" Treebeard bellowed in that annoying aural affectation that was all the rage among 3rd Age Ents (perhaps like the word 'man' in the 60's and 'like' or 'umm' currently). "I must gather the other Ents together," he boomed, "we must have a meeting as quickly as possible!"

Merry and Pippin were amazed at Treebeard's sudden hastiness. "A meeting?" Pippin wondered. 'What kind of a meeting?"

"An Ent moot," Treebeard said.

"Don't you mean an Ent _meet_?" Merry countered.

"No, I meant a _moot_," Treebeard replied curtly.

'Maybe he meant a _month_, as in the Ents _meet monthly_," Pippin said to Merry.

"Hrmmm…no, there aren't any Ents that meet monthly," Treebeard grunted, getting more and more perturbed as the discussion digressed. "We could not even get through roll-call in a month. But as I alluded to earlier, when there are concerns among the Ents, they are broached at moots."

"Oh, I see!" Merry laughed gleefully, relating the discussion to eating as usual: "Where Hobbits habitate, we _broast_ our _meat_; But where Ents entertain, they _broach_ their _moots_."

"Isn't it funny how accents differ so wildly throughout Middle-earth?" Pippin giggled.

Then Treebeard shook the Hobbits violently and hotly hroomed, "Cursed Halflings, the Ents do not eat meat! A moot is a meeting! The Ents meet at a moot! And moots are not monthly -- not that many Ents could meet monthly for a moot!"

"A moot is a meeting?" Merry squeaked, wincing from Treebeard's inexplicable ire.

"Yes!"

"And the Ents meet at a moot?" Pippin peeped in fear, shocked at the Ent's irrational anger.

"Yes!"

"And there is no broasted meat when Ents meet to broach at moots?"

"No!"

"And moots do not meet monthly…?"

"No!"

"…as there aren't enough Ents to meet at that many moots?"

"Precisely!"

Merry, never one to leave well enough alone, said, "My, do most Ents get so mean when they meet at moots? Does the mere mention of moots meet with much moodiness among ornery Ents?"

"No wonder why there aren't any Ents that meet at moots monthly!" Pippin cried.

Treebeard gazed in supplicative sadness across the vast gulf of time and space that separated the story from storyteller. An imploring whimper passed his mossy mouth, and the bark about his baleful brow bent as if to beseech the powers that be to relent, if only momentarily, from this harrowing harangue of the half-wit Halflings.

"Well, when do we leave?"

"Hrmmmm…when?"

"Yes, and where are we going?

"Where?"

"Where is the Ent Moot, silly," Pippin said as he rolled his eyes. "I know Ents are not hasty, but we can't very well sit here chatting all day when the Ents must be called to meet at the moot!"

Treebeard opened his mouth to speak, but rather than belabor the already burdensome conversation he strode off as briskly as his Entish stride could take him -- which covered quite a wide swath, actually -- _hrooming_ and _hoom-homming _the trumpeted clarion call of Entish alarm. Soon, Ents of all sizes, shapes and hues began arriving at the great, sunny glade known as the Entmoot. And as they lumbered into the clearing, Treebeard ticked off their names and deciduous or coniferous inclinations:

"Weeping Willow…hrrrrmmm…yes, always emotional."

"Scotch Pine, the thrifty."

"Boxwood…how are yew?"

"Crabapple, the curmudgeonly."

"Keen-sighted Birdseye Maple."

"Quaking Aspen, a shade too timid."

"Black Walnut, the requisite ethnic token."

After many hours of arrivals, announcements, greetings and branch thumping, Treebeard gently nudged the sleeping Hobbits, who had dozed off very early on. Treebeard's craggy face had a look of worried bewilderment as he hovered over the drowsy Hobbits.

"Treebeard, what is the matter?" Merry asked with genuine concern (even though he was yawning).

"Meriadoc…Peregrin," Treebeard said in a hesitant, confused tone, "the Entmoot has run into a bit of a problem…and…we need your help."

"Anything we can do to aid you, we shall!" Pippin said and jumped up quickly from the ground.

"Well…hrmmmm…that is quite kind of you, really." Treebeard muttered. "I am sure the Entmoot would appreciate any assistance you can offer in this matter."

Merry sighed impatiently. "And what matter do you need assistance with?"

"Hrooom-hom…well, well, well…where to begin, where to begin?"

Pippin knew better than to say 'just start at the beginning', because Treebeard would more than likely commence from the point when he was a mere Enting and work his way forward a few ages to the present. "How about not beginning at all, and just state your problem?"

"Hrrrmmm, hasty folk, hasty folk!" Treebeard grumbled. "Well, if you must know, it concerns our meeting – the Entmoot…"

"Yes, yes, go on!" Merry said.

"Well…hrrrmmm…It seems…"

"It seems, yes?" Pippin said.

"…it seems we have forgotten what the purpose was for calling this Entmoot."

"What?" Merry cried. "We have been here since noon! It is already dark! We've been here for hours!"

"Yes, well, hrroooom, what with greetings and polite conversation, things have gotten a bit muddled," Treebeard mumbled abashedly.

Pippin, who had always been a bit cleverer than Merry, elbowed his companion. "I've only been dozing a few moments," he said quickly, giving Merry a sideways wink, "but I heard nearly your whole conversation."

"You did, did you?" Treebeard said with noticeable relief. "Errmmm…What was it that we said?"

"Well, you are all very angry."

"We…we are?" Treebeard replied, and the other Ents loomed in to listen.

"More than angry, really -- furious is more like it!"

"Furious? Yes, furious!" Treebeard growled and the other Ents hissed. "Hrrrrm-hom…and…errrr…why are we furious?"

"Because of Saruman!"

"Saruman?" Treebeard roared. "Yes, that damnable wizard! He…he…he…"

"He has destroyed countless acres of forest!"

"Countless acres!" Willow wept.

"I didna think sooch a thin' coul' 'appen!" Scotch Pine spat. "Sooch a bloody waste!"

"Damn straight, my niggah!" Black Walnut nodded, flashing his grove sign.

"And it's only a matter of time…"

"Only a matter of time, until what?" Treebeard roared, now positively hasty.

"Until Saruman destroys the rest of Fangorn!"

The Ents howled and stamped about wildly and gnashed their wooden molars until they spat shavings.

"This is why all you Ents have voted to attack Isengard."

"_Arboreta vult_!" Treebeard bellowed in fury. "To Isengard!" And the other Ents took up the cry as they marched off in the direction of Orthanc.

Merry stood with mouth agape, watching as the angry swarm of Ents filed out of the Entmoot. "Damn, Pippin!" he finally whispered. "How the hell did you just do that?"

Pippin gave Merry a haughty sneer, sniffed and replied, "Well, my dear Meriadoc, let us just say that Entish herd behavior is my particular branch of study."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven: The Not-Quite-Right White Rider**

Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli surveyed the smoldering remnants of the battle between Eomer's Rohirrim and the Orcs that had kidnapped Merry and Pippin. A couple hundred dead Orcs were piled in a great heap and burned – but how? Did the Riders of Rohan carry about cans of petrol with them? Are Orcs naturally flammable? Or did the Rohirrim assemble a huge pile of brush and wood from nearby Fangorn (which they supposedly _superstitiously_ avoided), and go through the arduous process of lighting the kindling, then igniting larger logs, then dumping the Orcs atop the monstrous pyre (which would have taken hours – in addition to burying their own dead)? And if the Riders did waste such an inordinate amount of time to dispose of Orcs that would have quite easily decayed by natural means in that god-forsaken, unpopulated spot, why do so? LET'S CALL ATTENTION TO OURSELVES! HELLO, ANYONE WITHIN A HUNDRED MILES – HERE WE ARE! JUST FIND THE BONFIRE AND THEN FOLLOW THE HOOF PRINTS!

_*sighs*_

Anyway, the acrid, charnel reek hung like a foul fog in the air, stinging the Three Hunters' eyes and burning their nostrils. On a more somber note, the smoke played havoc with the ph balance of Legolas' silken hair, robbing it of its natural sheen and making it dry and brittle; but, as with all such epic adventures where life and death hang in the balance, the heroic Legolas bravely overcame this horrific adversity – a noble sacrifice awestruck Elvish minstrels would sing of adoringly for years to come.

Aragorn smiled sadly at the irony of Legolas' hirsutical sacrifice, which might one day become a thing of legend. But would that be so for the ranger's lack of height? Would history smile on the diminutive Dunedain son, and accord him added inches as a measure of his great deeds? TV adds weight, epic movie accomplishments add height: Sly Stallone was actually a pygmy kidnapped from his African tribe and dyed pink – how else does one explain a short Caucasian man named Sylvester speaking in what sounds like Ebonics? Needless to say, Aragorn certainly hoped _his_ side would win, because from an _emotivist_ point of view he could then rewrite history to suit his stature and get away with it. You see, Dunedain were _normative relativists_ for the most part, following in the footsteps of the _meta-ethical_ Elves, ethnocentric cynics who rewrote Middle-earth history without compunction, having no moral compass, and holding no moral statement to be true or false – which is why Elves say both 'yes and no' to everything.

Of course, once he gained ultimate power, a non-cognitivist like Aragorn could then purge Middle-earth of unsavory elements like Orcs, Dwarves, Hobbits and Elves, making the world safe for the dominion of 4th Age Man, and the dawning of modernity. Naturally, such things as _Eldaricide_ or a _Hobbicaust_ would be hushed up – he would float the stories that the Elves all sailed to the West and Halflings had become shy of the big folk, and thus all but invisible – and in the place of such atrocities the benevolent and just King Elessar Telcontar would leave the world a mighty mythos of a lost land of Faery and a Golden Age, not to mention a 12 step hero's journey that Joseph Campbell would pontificate on ages from now. But such political necessities and literary propaganda were far in the future; he had need of these ludicrous legendary freaks for the time being.

"What a strange, menacing look you have, Aragorn," Gimli said, stirring the man from his dark reverie. "You look as if you were plotting a new world order."

"No…no, not at all, friend Gimli," Aragorn replied, chuckling at his own absurdity. "I was just considering how different our story might be if we abandoned all our moral imperatives and operated strictly on a surgically skeptical basis."

"We'd be no better than Orcs," the Dwarf grunted derisively. "And our story would be long-forgotten, relegated to the dust-bin of literature like most post-modern cynicism. It would have no heart -- it would have no balls!"

"Don't let pathos get the best of you," Aragon laughed.

"Pathos? Isn't he one of the _Three Musketeers_?" Gimli grinned.

Aragorn raised an eyebrow. "Wait a minute, wait a minute! Gimli, you…you have no outlandish accent!"

"On the contrary," Gimli huffed indignantly, "I am currently using a Midwestern American accent, which is the preferred idiom for news broadcasting throughout the United States and Canada due to its lack of inflection or annoying regional colloquialisms."

"Well, it's certainly a welcome change from the last several chapters," Aragorn heaved a relieved sigh.

'Wight!" Legolas cried. 'Those widicuouswy eccentwic accents wewe incompwehensibew."

Passing the ring of battle beyond the still-flaring pyre, Aragorn found something of great interest. "Look here!" he cried. "There are strands of frayed rope in the grass and crumbs of lembas scattered all about."

"Stwange! What do you make of this widdle, Awagown?" Legolas puzzled.

"Hmmm…near as I can tell, the Hobbits somehow escaped their captors, cut their bindings here, and, rather than escaping into the forest like sensible folk, leisurely munched on Elvish snack food whilst watching the ferocious battle as it unfolded only yards away from them."

"This parody just gets weirder and weirder," Gimli grumbled.

"Yes, it does rather strain the bounds of credulity," Aragorn muttered as he followed the nonchalant Hobbits' trail. "After they had supped and rested for a goodly period of time, it looks like both Merry and Pippin finally scampered off into Fangorn in this direction."

So, with no mention of how they managed to drag the horses along through an incredibly dense and stifling primeval wood, the Three Hunters made their way into Fangorn. Here and there, they found evidence of the Hobbits' passing, which gave them renewed hope that Merry and Pippin were faring well; however, the three became concerned over another set of immense tracks that followed and then overtook the Hobbits.

"I've never seen anything like this," Aragorn said in amazement. "It's as if the Hobbits had been trailed by a giant wooden badger."

"Why a badger?" Gimli asked.

"Well, it would not be in context with the general outline of the parody if I said a giant wooden orangutan or platypus, would it?" Aragorn shrugged.

"These twacks wook wike woots to me," Legolas disagreed.

"Wook wike woots?" Gimli snickered.

"Yes, woots, foowish Naugwim!" Legolas frowned. "These wook wike twacks weft by twee woots."

"Weft by…twee woots?" Aragorn and Gimli said in unison.

But Legolas ignored his comrades' derisive tone and raised a finger to his lips. "Shhhh, be vewy quiet. We are being hunted by Wabbis."

"Wabbis?" Aragorn said in befuddlement. "You mean rabbis? I see no rabbis."

"Is Fangorn even kosher?" Gimli asked.

"Can you not see him?" Legolas answered, trying his best to stay away from the letters 'L' and 'R'. "He is passing in yon shadows…" Then he pointed, rather than saying something like 'Thewe, swinking suwweptitouswy fwom twee to twee'.

"Him? That's not a rabbi," Aragorn said as he caught sight of an old man in dirty gray rags. "He's not even wearing a yarmulke."

"Hmmm…perhaps he's that sneaky sorcerer that Eomer warned us about," Gimli growled and hefted his axe. "It could be that Saruman fellow!"

"I'll bet you're right, Gimli!" Aragorn cried. "And if that is the case, we must be very careful or he shall cast a spell on us. Do not let him speak, for he has the gift of gab!"

And the Three Hunters drew their weapons, silently creeping ever closer to the suspicious-looking old man. When the ragged beggar stepped out from behind the trees and into a clearing, they saw their chance and sprang to the attack. But where once a bedraggled and gray-bearded senior citizen stood, there was now a blinding flash of white light. Legolas' arrow burnt to cinders in mid-flight, Aragorn's sword became red-hot in his hands, and Gimli whiffed terribly on a mighty swing and ended up sprawling face first on the greensward.

"No respect! No respect, I tell you!" the elderly beggar spat as he pulled his gray rags tightly about himself, cloaking his spectral brilliance. "Three young hoodlums trying to rob a frail, old man…what's Middle-earth coming to? Back in my day, thievery was practiced strictly among Orcs and Trolls and Ring addicts, but nowadays, it seems even Elves and Dwarves are brigands and bandits!"

"I am no bwigand!" Legolas protested.

"And I am no bandit!" Gimli concurred. The Dwarf stared curiously at the old man, and then said in awe, "Gandalf?"

The old man did not reply to the dwarf, but merely kept on opining, "And another thing, I am all for racial harmony, but it is a rather sad commentary on the breakdown of social order when the only solidarity one sees between the races of Elves, Dwarves and Men is if they are involved in a criminal enterprise!"

By now, both Legolas and Aragorn recognized the wizard too. "Gandalf, forgive us!" Aragorn shouted as he fell to one knee.

"Who? forgive you for what?" the old man grumbled.

"Gandalf, it is you, you are alive!" Gimli cried with tears of joy.

"Gandalf? Who the hell is that?" the elderly beggar hissed.

"You…you are Gandalf! Praise Eru, you are back!" Aragorn bowed while still genuflecting.

"I don't know who the hell you think I am, but I am certainly not Gandalf!"

"But you awe Mifwandiw!" Legolas replied. "I can heaw it in youw voice!"

"Who's the femme with the speech impediment?" the old man said to Aragorn.

"He is Legolas, an Elf of Mirkwood," Aragorn answered, "and this is Gimli the Dwarf, and I am Aragorn, Chief of the Dunedain of the North -- certainly you must remember me?"

"Legolas?" the old man mumbled.

"Yes," they all replied.

"And Gimli?"

"Yes, yes!"

"And Aragorn?"

"Yes, yes, yes!"

The beggar frowned and spat. "I don't know any of you. Now bugger off and leave me alone!"

"But Gandalf," Gimli cried, "we need you…the Fellowship needs you!"

The old man rolled his eyes. "My name is not Gandalf," he said between clenched teeth. "If you must know, my name is Merlin."

"Merlin?"

"Yes, Merlin!"

"But Merlin was not all dressed in white," Aragorn rebutted, recalling reading _Le Morte d'Arthur_ for a class at Rivendell High. "He had robes with stars and moons and astrological signs all over them!"

"Did not!" the beggar growled.

"And a high conical hat with a pointy end!"

"Lies, all lies!"

"Not to mention he did not live in 3rd Age Middle-earth, but during the Romano-Celtic period in Britain at the time of the Anglo-Saxon invasions."

"Asshole!"

"Say what you will," Aragorn laughed, "but we know who you are: GANDALF!"

"Bah!" the old man bellowed. "You are wrong! There is nothing you can say that will suck me into this parody again."

"What did you just say?" Gimli shot back.

"Nothing," the beggar blurted nervously, "nothing at all."

"On the contwawy," Legolas countered, "you said you did not want to be sucked into the pawody _again_, impwying…"

"Implying that you have indeed already played a part in this farce!" Aragorn interrupted triumphantly, "Therefore…"

"More Hobbitisms!" Gimli chuckled.

"No!" Gandalf moaned.

"Pages and pages of anachwonisms, double-entendwes and witewawy witticisms!" Legolas added.

"Please, no…"

Aragorn smiled mischievously and put the final nail in the coffin: "And let us not forget, more singing at the most inopportune times!"

"You…you bastards!" Gandalf hissed.

Aragorn shrugged. "Hey, if we have to go through with this, so do you!"

Gandalf's shoulders sagged as the immensity of the situation weighed upon him. After a few moments of muttered curses, threats against his agent and uncontrolled blinking and facial tics, the wizard finally sighed, "All right, all right, you got me, damn you! But can we at least end the chapter here so I can get my head back into the story?"

"Certainly," Aragorn said with a sympathetic pat on the wizard's back. "In any case, I believe it's time for a commercial."

**~~oo~OO~oo~OO~oo~~**

_*Thunderous, thumping tympanis resound in booming welcome for Aaron Copeland's 'Fanfare for the Common Man'*_

**The pride…**

_*Trumpets proclaim with brazen acclaim*_

**And pageantry…**

*_French horns with tympani cannonades follow in the trumpets' triumphal wake_*

**The glory…**

*_The orchestra builds in waves of thrumming and thrilling sound_*

**And glamour…**

_*A dazzling crescendo of contrapuntal music washes over all*_

**Shouldn't all anal bleaching creams have such a stirring theme?**

_*A single bugle blurts a blunt note*_

_**Symphony Anal Bleach®**_** the revitalizing cream formula with 2% hydroquinone tightens and tones as it lightens and whitens tired, flaccid sphincters. **

_**Symphony Anal Bleach®**_** for a beautiful butthole every time!**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight: Pabulum and Panoply – The Madness of Théoden King **  
**(Written in nearly blank verse by Will Shakespeare's besotted and iambically-challenged cousin thrice-removed ****on his mum's side, **  
**Oswald Drinksbière, ****who was all we could afford, given this parody's shoestring budget)**

**ACT I**

**SCENE I. Outside of Fangorn**  
**GANDALF, ARAGORN, LEGOLAS and GIMLI exit the forest.**

**ARAGORN**  
Gandalf, where didst thou go in Moria?  
Methought with waking eyes a mære perceiv'd --  
Incubus benighted, a fiery sleepless fear –  
With cat 'o' nine ablaze did draw thee down  
Into the roiling maw of Khazad's gloom.

**GANDALF**  
Long time I fell, and with me he who rose  
Before the Fall that held Milton enthrall'd --  
In days when Morgoth was not yet enchain'd  
Beyond the starless Door of Night -- thence came  
This darkling angel wreath'd in flames so dire,  
Who strove to 'whelm me o'er in ageless feud.

**LEGOLAS**  
What's this? Why speakest thus with wacky words?

**GIMLI**  
'Tis yet one more contrivance by the curs'd  
And callous narrator, who scribes us two  
As playing pawnish prats, while those nobler  
Ones prattle on in high estate – I guess.

**LEGOLAS**  
And thus, with comedy, we motley fools  
Enact for rabble crowds in penny seats?

**GIMLI**  
Aye, friend. But soft! Yon wizard waxes wise  
With wondrous words – make way for that wanker!

**GANDALF**  
The Balrog's bated breath about me blew--  
All cheap cigars and tub-brew'd Chianti –  
I yet did not in lover's swoon fall prey  
To cozening demands of his, and striv'd  
With ever weakening resolve to foil  
The predator's fell pounce for gamey prey:  
For that whoreson I wouldst the coquette play!

**ARAGORN**  
'Tis not the stuff that legends make, it seems!  
For this, I am now quite perplex'd with thee:  
No battle fierce you claim to make; not but  
A scull'ry maiden's venal virtue lost  
Unto a fiery Lothario!

**LEGOLAS**  
Slut!

**GIMLI**  
So -- cheap seats, cheaper play! This Soap shall not  
E'er wash the dirty thoughts from out my mind.  
Out, damned spot!

**LEGOLAS**  
He is outted – the tramp!

**GANDALF**  
So, dowsed I did Udun's ardor aflame,  
And turn'd the tables 'round the burning brute.  
With sword unfurl'd from 'neath my robes I thrust,  
And thus, I smote him where the sun shines not.

**ARAGORN**  
With that, methinks I shall with vomit spew.

**GIMLI**  
O end this mess, and please bring forth Scene Two!

**SCENE II. Same place, less racy material.**

**GANDALF**  
Sent back I came naked.

**GIMLI **  
'Tis no surprise!

**GANDALF **  
Until my task is done.

**LEGOLAS**  
Not soon enough!

**GANDALF**  
What say you? Shall we to horse, my friends?

**ARAGORN**  
We have but horses two, and I shall not  
Be sitting presidentially with thee.

**GANDALF**  
No need has thou to take a back seat, friend.  
A horse, a horse – the Istar needs a horse!

**GIMLI **  
He calls to nothing but thin air, the fool!

**LEGOLAS **  
Methinks there's method to his madness yet,  
For look, betwixt yon ferny tors – a horse!

**GIMLI**  
Well damn'd I am!

**GANDALF **  
And damn'd thou shalt e'er be,  
My doltish Dwarf: for this is Shadowfax,  
The equine exemplar, the Meara gray!

**GIMLI**  
Eh?_ Gay mirror_? Reflects its rider, does't?

**GANDALF**  
_Grey Meara_, fool! Art thou as short on mind  
As matter? Never trust a Dwarf: 'tis said  
Their brains are too near to their bottoms bare!

**ARAGORN**  
And thus, the bottom's fallen out of this  
Odd dialogue -- to Edoras let's fly!  
A change of scenery we need before  
We shall upon this plain all up and die!

**ACT II**

**SCENE I. At Edoras, capital of Rohan**  
**GANDALF, ARAGORN, LEGOLAS and GIMLI try to enter Meduseld, the Golden Hall.**

**HÁMA**  
Who comes here? Freaks! My King forbids entrance!

**GANDALF**  
A valet better mind his place. Ushers  
Are at one's beck and call. Announce us to  
Your Lord with haste, or I will ask ol' Gimli here  
To bite your knees and gnaw your ankles down  
To bloody stubs!

**HÁMA**  
Oh dear! I'll be right back!

**GANDALF**  
I think this ward will mind his manners now.

**ARAGORN**  
Or else he's scared of Dwarvish cannibals!

**HÁMA**  
I'm back.

**GANDALF**  
I see.

**HÁMA**  
Thou can enter here, but…

**GANDALF**  
Ah! Quid pro quos?

**HÁMA**  
We speak no Elvish here!

**GANDALF**  
In speech, is Elvish consider'd selfish?

**ARAGORN**  
A fishy kettle, surely. Háma speak!

**HÁMA**  
Enter without weapons and be welcome.

**GANDALF**  
My staff?

**HÁMA**  
A prop for age, mayhap – or wizard's tool?

**GANDALF**  
My pension card shows that I have retired.

**HÁMA**  
Then go in peace, Gandalf. I trust old farts.

**SCENE II. MEMBERS of the FELLOWSHIP meet THÉODEN ****and GRIMA WORMTONGUE**

**GANDALF**  
Hail, Théoden, Fengel's son, Rohan King!

**THÉODEN**  
Bl-a-a-a-a-h-n...ver-r-r-h-h-h…na-a-a-a-w!

**GANDALF**  
Pardon me?

**GRIMA**  
No blank verse.

**GANDALF**  
Say what?

**GRIMA**  
The king – he wants no blank verse. It would overly tax him. We must shift to narrative storytelling and away from foul Elvish meter, because the king is ill…

**THÉODEN**  
A-n-n-n-h...sl-e-e-e-e-py.

**GRIMA**  
Yes, I know you are tired, milord. And these fools care not for your health as I do.

**GANDALF**  
Why, this is unheard of! One cannot just abruptly change from poetic form to narrative exposition…

**THÉODEN**  
A-y-y-y-y-y-a-m-m-m...kin-n-n-n-gah...h-e-e-e-re!

Gandalf understood enough of Théoden's mumbling to know that it was useless to argue the point further, particularly since Grima had such an unnatural hold over the king. "Very well," the wizard spat angrily at Wormtongue, "but a format change will not avail you, Flame of Udun!"

"Ummm…Gandalf, you are drifting," Aragorn whispered. "We're in Rohan, not Moria."

"Oh…right," Gandalf muttered in embarrassment. "This whole resurrection thing has got me confounded!"

Grima, feeling he had the advantage at this point, growled, "Lathspell, I name thee. Ill-news is an ill guest!"

"Ga-a-a-a-a-nd-a-a-lf...St-o-o-o-o-rm...Cro-o-o-o-o-o-w!" Théoden moaned until he became short of breath and fell back into his seat.

"Bravo, your majesty, bravo!" Grima shouted and patted the king's arm patronizingly. "I'll make sure you get some raisins in your porridge tonight!"

"Ra-a-a-a-a-i-i-i-sins! Yu-u-u-u-u-m-m-m-m-y!"

Gandalf had seen enough. He threw off his gray rags and his brilliant white robes shone with a spectral light in the bleakness of the shadowed hall. With a wave of his staff, the dusty tapestries that blocked the high windows fell away and the blinding bright gleam of the midday sun cut through the smoky gloom.

"Drat, the wizard's rod!" Grima hissed. "Stay away from the king with your evil tool, Gandalf; it might give him a staff infection!"

"The only sickness here is the one you have visited on Théoden, traitorous Grima!" Gandalf cried. "Down, dog! Grovel, thou cur of Saruman!"

With a blast from Gandalf's staff, Wormtongue was sent sprawling, falling face-first at the foot of the dais. The wizard then strode forcefully toward the king, who cringed in terror on his throne. "Why for you do this to me, Dimmy?" Théoden groaned in a vaguely Greek accent.

"It is just as I thought," Gandalf roared, "the King is possessed!" So saying, the wizard brought out a vial of clear liquid from beneath his robe. This he sprinkled liberally on the king while shouting, "The power of Manwë compels you!"

"Miruvor," Aragorn whispered to Gimli. "Particularly effective in wightish exorcisms."

Théoden writhed in agony on the throne and then cried, "Ego te absolvo a peccatis tuis!"

Gandalf brought forth a piece of Lembas and pressed it against the king's forehead, and Théoden shrieked as if he had been branded by white-hot iron. "The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back and all turns to silver glass," Gandalf cried above the king's tormented sobs.

"Chickenshit!" Théoden bellowed. "You Maiar suck cocks in henhouses!"

"In a hole there lived a Hobbit!" Gandalf shouted, and then, "Confusticate and bebother thee, shade of Saruman!"

"I'm melting…melting!" Théoden sobbed. "What a world, what a world!" He then fell silent.

"It is done," Gandalf sighed in relief. "Give him some athelas and then ring me in the morning."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine: **_**It's About Bloody Time You Published This Chapter. Bastard!**_

**THÉODEN: **_I know Grima's deceived me, now here's a surprise --  
__I know Wormtongue has 'cause there's magic in my eyes…_

"Stop this instant!" Gandalf bellowed. "There shall be no more musical numbers while I'm here! I didn't pass through fire and death to high kick in a chorus line!"

"See, my king," Grima hissed disparagingly to Théoden, "the brash wizard attempts to overrule you. Ever has Gandalf sought to be the master of your house!"

"Well, if that isn't the pot calling the kettle black!" Théoden laughed, noting the irony of Grima's words.

"There, there, your majesty," the fawning Grima replied. "I can see you still do not have your wits about you." He smiled in a wan, pitying manner and added, "But Grima is not a kitchen utensil, and the wizard is not a kettle and the guards are not forks and spoons."

Théoden heaved an irritated sigh. "Trouble me no longer with your crooked words, Grima," the king grumbled. "If I had relied on your leechcraft any further, you would have had me crawling about on all fours like a dog."

Grima patted the king's head. "But your majesty, you used to love to roll over and play dead." Then, under his breathe, Wormtongue mumbled, "And that's the way I would have preferred you!"

"What was that?" Théoden growled.

"I said, 'I only live to serve you', O mighty king!"

"Yes, you are a trusted servant, Grima, but not of the King of Rohan," Gandalf shrewdly surmised. "How long has it been since you were bought and paid for by Saruman? What was the agreed upon price?"

Grima turned and ogled Éomer up and down, licking his lips lasciviously.

_"E-W-W-W-W-W!" _The combined assembly gasped in disgust.

"No, no, no!" Grima growled irritably and motioned Éomer to move to one side. Behind him stood his virginal sister, the cold but beautiful Éowyn.

_"A-H-H-H-H-H-H!" _All assembled sighed in relief.

Éowyn blushed and tried to look perturbed, but she gave Grima a knowing wink before storming out of the hall in feigned outrage. Contrary to popular belief, Grima was not called 'Wormtongue' because of his crooked words; rather, he had a tongue as long as Gene Simmons', which put him in good stead with the ladies of court.

"Enough of this revisionist narration!" Théoden shivered in repulsion, the lurid thought of leering Grima licking lovely Éowyn leaving a livid lump in his lurching throat. "Rohan shall go to war! Hama and _Éomer_, prepare the Mark to ride out at once." Théoden glared angrily at Grima, but then another thought came to him. "Grima, you too shall gird your sword for battle," the king said with a fierce grin.

"Battle? Me? Well, yes, certainly milord," Grima stuttered, "anything for your majesty." He bit his lip and considered his words carefully. "But I would be loath to leave you here unassisted. Why, you might have a relapse! Who will straighten your drool cup and go to the pharmacy at one in the morning to get you _Depends_?"

"Your faithfulness warms my old heart, Grima," Théoden said with a glint in his eye. "But I shall not be staying here, and neither shall you." The king rose from his throne and clasped Grima's shoulder roughly. "I will lead Rohan into battle and you shall be at my side!" The king roared to the general acclaim of his subjects. "You and I, Grima, whacking heads and disemboweling Orcs. We shall ride into the thickest of the fray, yea 'til we veritably bathe in black blood. It will be grand!"

This was an ill turn Grima had not expected. He shifted uneasily from one leg to the other, trying desperately to wrest himself from Théoden's grasp, all the while wringing his damp hands together (and if any Tolkien character had sweaty palms, it was certainly Wormtongue).

"I can see you have gained some newfound stamina, milord," Grima mumbled nervously. "Most older men apply such friskiness to sexual pursuits. Perhaps I can line up a nubile shieldmaiden or two for you. You can play hide the scepter..."

"Nonsense, Grima," Théoden growled lustily, "We shall have all the shieldmaidens we desire once the Valkyrie take us up to Valhalla – after our glorious deaths on the field of battle!"

"Good lord, he is invoking Beowulf!" the worried Aragorn whispered to Gandalf.

"No worries; Théoden is expendable," Gandalf hissed rather callously. "It's his army we need presently. Let the old coot ramble – as long as the Rohirrim follow him into battle."

"Hello, excuse me!" Grima interrupted. "My big scene – no chatter from the peanut gallery, please!"

Unfortunately for Grima, the narrator, who had grown quite bored with the whole proceeding, had the fork-tongued counselor of fallacious fabrication physically flown to the fallow fields of Isengard. Abrupt, I know, but we have a musical to manage here.

"A musical?" Gandalf grumbled. "Well, that's it for me then!" Defeated and disgusted, the wizard started to walk away.

"Gandalf, don't leave, we need you!" Aragorn cried. "Where in blazes are you going?"

The wizard frowned mightily and shrugged. "I want no part of rock operas, music hall dance numbers or filthy filks; therefore, I am going to find Erkenbrand."

"Ummm…who is Erkenbrand?" Aragorn asked.

**WAITING FOR GONDOR**

**(Lemuel Beckett's absurdist two-act play whittled down to a single page of narrative for the sake of relieving the inveterate boredom related to plays – and to wordy absurdist plays in particular -- what with their parroting on about personal and public paradigms and parameters, whilst nihilistically relating human foibles in a stream-of-consciousness manner without moral or satisfying climax. So, get out your clove cigarettes and absinthe, don your Che Guevera t-shirt and put a volume of Camus or Sartre on your archetypical, upper-middle-class, bourgeois coffee table milled from recycled barn board, and recite after me: ****Stately, plump Buck Mulligan****…S****tately, plump Buck Mulligan****…****Stately, plump Buck Mulligan****…****Stately, plump Buck Mulligan****…)**

Erkenbrand dismounted gingerly from his steed and slumped onto a low mound of grass that jutted from the side of the rutted road. He grunted. Sluggishly, he attempted to pull off his boot and remove the insidious stone that had bitten into his arch for the last several leagues. But the boot was as immovable as he was exhausted. He made one last half-hearted attempt but was defeated before he even started.

"Such is life," he muttered tonelessly. "Life is such."

"I am of like mind," said Erestor, who had walked with his lame steed from the far side of the tumbling field. "But we Elves have fought the long defeat for the last three ages. We fought valiantly. We died with our boots on. But now the shoe seems to be on the other foot."

Erkenbrand simply shrugged off the irony. He should have been surprised at the sight of an Elf in the middle of Rohan, but he was just too tired. "I am glad to see Elves this far south once again; I thought you were gone forever."

"Forever?" Erestor laughed a bit. "A few years, a decade, a century: these seem an eternity to you Mannish-folk."

Erkenbrand caught the haughty undertones of the Elf's words. "But Prince Imrahil down in Dol Amroth claims to have Elven ancestors."

"Not bloody likely," Erestor grunted with his usual Noldorin disdain. "He is a nobody. A petty prince. Imrahil's mythic forebear couldn't even get a whiff of that perfumed pussy."

Erkenbrand was taken aback at the Elf's profane brusqueness. "So much for vaunted Elvish courtesy."

Erestor shrugged and sat next to the man of Rohan on the raised bit of turf. "Don't believe the hype," the Elf grumbled. "It is merely a device we Elves use to maintain a social advantage over you miserable Aftercomers."

Erkenbrand raised an eyebrow. He shifted the toes in his boot but the stubborn stone was lodged indelibly between sole and skin. He grimaced. Erestor noticed the man's discomfort but ignored it. Or perhaps he was amused by it. It could be that this precise moment was a microcosm of history itself, and the Firstborn at last refused to aid the Usurper. Erestor the rebel.

"Oh, would you lay off the stilted inner dialogue and help me?" Erkenbrand grumbled.

"Help you what?"

"Help me take off this boot!"

"Does it pain you?"

"Does it pain me? Who else but an effete Elf would utter such a phrase!"

"Does it hurt the precious?" Erestor hissed in return.

"Yes, it hurts. Damn it!"

"Live with pain; it will make you stronger."

"Is that an Elvish saying?"

"No, but it is appropriate in this instance."

Erkenbrand was not amused. He leaned again toward his stubborn footwear: a boot as bold as his brash Dunlender servants -- and just about as useless. He didn't want to show any weakness to the Elf, but he had ridden for many an hour and even the Horse Lords of Rohan knew well the exhaustion of mounted travel. Evidently, Elves did not. Erestor sighed in exasperation, rose without a hint of exertion, grabbed Erkenbrand's boot by the heel and casually slid it from the man's swollen foot. The recalcitrant rock rolled out onto the rutted road.

"There. All better?" Erestor smirked and then muttered, "So much for the _Gift of Men_."

"What do you mean by _that_?" Erkenbrand growled, quite tired of the Elf's pomposity.

"Nothing, nothing," Erestor said distractedly. "I just find it rather odd that Middle-earth shall be ruled by your" – and here he paused with a sour frown as if it were an effort to maintain a sense of decorum -- "your…race."

"Well, you high 'n' mighty folk have left us a piss-poor inheritance, to be sure," Erkenbrand laughed. "And what do you Elves know of Man's destiny in any case?"

"What do I know of Man's destiny?" Erestor pursed his lips. "I could tell you more of cabbages than mortal kings. But it matters not. Soon the Elves shall be leaving these shores."

"Leaving? Where are you off to?"

"West. Over the Sundering Sea. To Elvenhome."

"Pffft!" Erkenbrand spat. "It's not like you've been a bloody part of this world anyway."

"Beg pardon?"

"You Elves. You're like madly eccentric neighbors holed up in moldering mansions for countless years. Safe but insecure behind high iron gates. Weird, decrepit folk, mooning over past glories."

Erestor rolled his eyes. "And Men?" he laughed corrosively. "You know not where you are going, and you know not where you have been. You and your ilk are like little lap dogs chasing their tails. Thank Eru you lack the ability of the hound to lick its own private parts; otherwise, your race would be extinct."

Erkenbrand cursed and his face turned red. But Erestor merely laughed. "Forgive me. Please, forgive me, man of Rohan," the Elf said cheerfully. "We are allies; or, at least, we are both enemies of the One Enemy. And an enemy of my enemy is –"

"-- Is a friend?" Erkenbrand interrupted as he slowly unclenched his fists. "We Rohirrim have just such a saying."

"Most likely borrowed from the Elves," Erestor winked.

Now Erkenbrand laughed. "Then let us lay aside insult and misunderstanding and be on our way," he said as he slipped his boot back on.

"Hold!" Erestor answered, surveying the area with the visual acuity of the Elves. Seemingly satisfied, he added, "No sense in leaving. We might as well wait here."

"Wait? Wait for whom?"

"Wait for Gondor."

"Do you think they'll come?"

"Certainly," Erestor said with a certain certainty.

There was a very long silence. Gondor, it seems, was running late.

"Ummm," Erekenbrand hummed dumbly. "What shall we do while we wait?"

"How about a nice game of chess?" Erestor asked.

That would be fine," Erkenbrand nodded. "Do you have a set, Ingmar?"

"Yes, I have one in my saddle bag," the Elf replied. "And it is Erestor, not Ingmar."

The Elf laid the board on a boulder on the beach as the susurration of the surf sighed while sadly sidling up and down the sand.

"Alliteration is a hidebound byword for the Old Guard," The harlequin dwarf croaked as he brushed sand from his parti-colored pantaloons. "It is the sad gibbering pronouncement of the global cultural narrative." He then moved a pawn forward two spaces (but he never actually used the word _pawn_ – to him, it was 'proletarian worker held in thrall by bloody monarchists').

The old fishwife aggressively brought out her knight. "Lor, 'ere ye go agin'," she spat, "rejectin' classic forms 'o' lit'rature fer yer post-modern caterwaulin'. 'Oil take th' 'literation 'o' Beowulf o'er Joyce's pale imertations, truth t' tell. Gimme Blake or Shakespeare any ol' day – it's blokes loike Borges 'n' Burroughs what gets me 'ackles up."

The Harlequin dwarf's motley cap tinkled merrily as he loomed over the chessboard, but the jester was not pleased by the fishwife's harangue. He glowered. With a wave of his mock scepter, his bauble, he signaled to the one-eyed undertaker, who blew a futile horn, took his place behind the shrew, and waited. It is what funeral directors do best: wait, patiently. The Harlequin moved another 'proletarian worker held in thrall by bloody monarchists' up a space to guard his brother worker.

"All I'm sayin'," the fishwife muttered, peering uneasily over her shoulder at the silent, vulturine man of the dismal trade, "is ye bloody well can't abandon four 'unnert year of lit'rary accomplishments merely by loudly proclaimin' th' failure 'o' language and Man's unability of escapin' 'is condition." She then slyly baited the Harlequin with a pawn prone at the center of the board.

The bells flopping from the three folds of the Harlequin's headgear jangled with the unnerving minimalism of a Phillip Glass composition. Barely able to contain his glee, he quickly took the fishwife's pawn and said, "Only a buffoon would have made that move."

The fishwife laughed aloud and took the Harlequin's pawn with her knight. "Tatterdemalion!" she squealed with delight. "You even babble in post-modern self-referential irony!"

Standing ankle-deep in the surf, a mime wept silently.

"Mister Frodo, Mister Frodo," Sam said nervously as he jostled his master awake. "It's getting near dawn. P'raps we'd best get on our way."

"Oh Sam, I had the oddest dream," Frodo grumpled as he yawned and stretched. "It was an absurdist nightmare with Rohirrim, Elves, jesters, fishwives, one-eyed undertakers, mimes and the music of Phillip Glass."

"I prefer John Cage or Zappa, personally," Sam grunted in disapproval.

"Sam," Frodo sighed in that irritatingly wistful manner that appears both in the film and books with equally annoying clarity, "when will it be our turn?"

"Our turn for what, Mister Frodo?"

"Our turn in the narrative. It's been several chapters now."

"Well, begging your pardon here," Sam said humbly, "but it seems plain to me that the parody is following the book a might closer than the film. So, the rest 'o' the Fellership's got a while to go in their roles a' fore our part comes up again."

"Bugger!"

"Fucking-A right, Mister Frodo."


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten: Helm's Cheap (It's only a model)**

**THE BALLAD OF HELM HAMMER TOE**

Hmmm…nothing heroic about a deformity of the proximal interphalangeal joint of the second, third or fourth toe, save perhaps going barefoot to a beach party. How about…

**THE BALLAD OF HELM HAMMERHEAD**

No one would ever expect Helm Hammerhead, the Rohirric Land Shark!

*_knock, knock_*

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Who is it?

**Voice behind the door:** Pizza delivery.

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Pizza? Even as an obvious anachronism, pizza does not appear in 3rd Age Middle-earth!

*_knock, knock_*

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Who is it?

**Voice behind the door:** Maintenance.

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Look, I have dirt floors and no indoor toilet facilities. There is nothing to maintain. Try again.

*_knock, knock_*

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Who is it?

**Voice behind the door:** Helm Hammerhead.

**Wolf, son of Freca:** Nonsense! It is the middle of winter and there is a blinding blizzard! We will just see who is out there…

*_opens the door_*

**Wolf, son of Freca: **E-e-e-e-a-a-a-a-u-u-u-u-g-g-g-h-h-h-h!

**THE BALLAD OF HELM HAMMER & SICKLE**

Perhaps we should just dispense with political satire, as it raises too many red flags.

*_silence_*

Red flags…

*_crickets chirping_*

You know, hammer and sickle – get it?

*_a distant rim shot sounds on the horizon_*

Oh, never mind. Humorless bastards.

**THE BALLAD OF HELM HAMMER TIME**

_Thou canst touch this,_  
_Thou canst touch this,_  
_Thou canst touch this,_  
_Thou canst touch this_…

_Please Helm, don't hurt 'em!_

Cut! Cut! Cut!

Oh, bother.

**THE BALLAD OF HELM HAMMERHAND**

Hammerhand? Oh for Christ's sake, this bit just keeps getting more and more ridiculous! What, are we going to have a character with ball-peens rather than knuckles? It sounds like a nemesis in a Marvel comic book plot: "Quick, Aunt May, go get Spiderman – the diabolical Hammerhand has kidnapped M.J. and is climbing up the Daily Bugle building!"

Hmmmm? What was that? Helm Hammerhand really _was_ a character in Lord of the Rings lore? We are no longer coming up with satiric names at this point? Blimey.

All right then, bring in **The Hengist & Horsa Memorial Old English Choir and Beowulfian Bronze Age Band**!

*_A horde of snarling Saxons tramp onto the stage_*

Helm, Helm, Helm, Helm --  
Helm, Helm, Helm, Helm --  
Helm, Helm, Helm, Helm --  
Helm, Helm, Helm, Helm --

Hammerhand, O hero of yore,  
Snowbound warrior in times before  
The current story was e'er written,  
Adding depth for the reader smitten  
With tales and maps and Viking crap,  
Because pirates have yet to be invented.

Bitter bane of the Land of Dun,  
Superlatively notable personage for which this tale is spun --  
A woven ode to Odin's offspring,  
The convoluted Jute of whom we sing;  
But whether Saxon or Geat, Old Helm can't be beat --  
Even when his jaunty helm has been dented.

Who preyed upon the Dunlenders just like a bearded vulture?  
**HELM!**

Who ended up so sadly as a Rohirrim ice sculpture?  
**HELM!**

Who gave his name to a rampart, a deeping coomb and cave?  
**HELM!**

Who, alas! has utterly no tomb nor crypt nor grave?  
***_sniff_***

Hammerhand, O national legend of vigorous pith!  
Like Jesus or Robin Hood, you're more of a myth.  
Just an old bugger out there in the snow,  
Homeless vagrant around whom has grown  
A bold tale of travail -- of a hero without fail --  
Because, after all, pirates have yet to be invented.

*_the snarling Saxons stamp off stage_*

"That were 'orrible!"

"Sod off, miserable critic!"

*_silence_*

"So, that's it then?"

"What's 'it' then?"

"Th' chapter. It's over then?"

"Yes."

*_additional silence_*

"Well --"

"Well?"

"It's rather short. Rather."

"It is as long as was necessary. Necessarily so."

*_prolonged additional silence_*

"I'm just sayin'--"

"Saying what, exactly?"

"P'raps th' chapter could be – oh, I don't know – a bit lengthier."

"Why? It added nothing to the overall plot. It rabbited on about a secondary character barely mentioned in the story. It wasn't even particularly funny."

"Oh."

*_silence, uncomfortably prolonged_*

*_see, I've added a second line to further the uncomfortably prolonged silence_*

"Your hand. It's on my butt, Charles."

"Yes, I know, Robert."

"Shall we to bed then, m'lady?"

"Certainly, my bundt cake of frosted passion."

*_silence, punctuated by groans, moan, bleats and funny grunting noises_*

"Was it good for you?"

"Oh, yes."

"Cigarette?"

"Thank you."

"What about the goat?"

"None for him. He don't smoke."

"Too young?"

"Yeah. He's just a kid."


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter **_**Elven**_**: Helm's Deep (no, really -- this time for sure)**

King Théoden surveyed the defenses of Helm's Deep from the highest rampart of the fortress. Quite satisfied with the myriad CGI figures scurrying about the large-scale _bigature_, the king was about to take a nap; unfortunately, his regal rest was disturbed by Hama, captain of the royal guard.

"My Lord!" Hama hollered. "The army of thine enemy dost fast approacheth!"

Théoden grumbled as he wearily made his way back up the flight of flagstone steps. He was not sure if he was more perturbed at the speedy arrival of Saruman's army or by Hama's annoying attempt at archaic English. "How in blazes did Saruman's forces get here so quickly?" the king grunted as he vainly peered through the darkness. Hopelessly nearsighted and unable to see the oncoming Orcs, Théoden merely shrugged and took Hama at his word.

"Ready the archers!" the king bellowed with belligerent bellicosity. "But do not shoot until you see the whites of their eyes."

The archers nocked their arrows and raised their bows skyward in anticipation.

"Ummm…my Lord," Hama whispered nervously, "it is night. The archers more than likely won't be able to see the enemies' faces, let alone the whites of their eyes."

Théoden frowned mightily. "Lack of visual acuity is no excuse for not following orders, Hama," the king growled. "Now, I want the concentration of arrow fire to be leveled there and there." So saying, Théoden pointed vigorously towards the desired positions.

"My Lord," Hama said with increasing consternation, "if the archers shot in that direction, they would take out most of our reserves. Perhaps if we had them aim beyond our walls…"

"Nonsense," Théoden scoffed as he squinted down into the courtyard at the unwitting targets of his misplaced ferocity. "I am willing to take some losses for the greater good. We kings must make such tough decisions."

"Yes, certainly my Lord," Hama said while rolling his eyes. "I suppose it is your prerogative to wipe out half your army with your own archers, but…"

Meanwhile, the archers had been in position for a bit too long and were straining to hold their bowstrings taut, their fingers and arms cramping as they maintained their aim. One of the older men, pressed into service as a bowman due to the filmable character of his craggy face, lost his grip. With a vibrant thrum of the string, he let an arrow fly.

The arrow whistled into the night air, lazily rising higher and higher until its arching flight reached its apex and then came hurtling back down toward earth. With a final hiss, it thumped forcefully into a shield of the advancing army.

Hey dere, yøu dummkopfen hörsey-völk!" a voice shrieked from the darkness. "Vhy för yøu be schöötin' dem dere árrás? Umpen up dese here schtupid gåtes, eh? I ám för väntin' to tålk vit yøu!"

Inside the keep, Legolas, who had been busy braiding and plaiting his platinum locks in anticipation of the oncoming battle, dropped a hairpin and gasped. Noticeably shaken, the Elf of Mirkwood staggered toward the wall and shouted, "Daddy?"

There was a long, apprehensive silence, followed by a querulous reply: "Leggy-lås? Leggy-lås! Dåt durn vell better nöt've been yøu schöötin dem dere árrás åt yer pappa! Yust cuz yer momma sez ye be der fruit øv mein schwanz, døn't mean yøu cån be yöösurpin' der trøne, nåughty li'l elflet!"

Red-faced, Legolas turned to Aragorn and Gimli and sighed, "It is Thwanduil, my fawtha. What a pwedicament!"

"My, this is awkward," Aragorn grimaced as he caught Gimli's eye. Gimli smirked and stifled a snicker. Aragorn kicked the Dwarf. "Why exactly is your father here?" Aragorn said quickly, muffling Gimli's grunt in the process.

"Goodness gwacious, how should I know!" Legolas cried. "I haven't seen him in sevewal decades."

"Several decades?" Aragorn said incredulously.

Legolas bowed his head and replied, "Not since befowe the Battle of Five Awmies at Ewebor. He and the awmy never weturned to Mewkwood."

"But that – that was over sixty years ago!" Aragorn said with amazement. "Didn't you wonder where he was?"

"We awe immowtal, Awagorn," Legolas shrugged. "It sometimes takes us a decade just to have a bowel movement." The Elf absentmindedly kicked a stone and added, "Besides, we wewe nevew weawy cwose -- wike most fawthas and chiwdwen."

While Aragorn attempted to decipher Legolas' last sentence, Hama had managed to convince King Théoden that the advancing force was not Orkish but in fact Elven, and that it was no longer necessary to decimate the Rohirrim cowering in the courtyard. The great Gates of Helm's Deep were opened wide, and in strode King Thranduil, followed by his trusty captain, Götterdämmerungsdottir, and his not-so-trusty lieutenants, Fjalarvilhjálmsson and Þórssonorðlenska. There, Théoden, Hama, Éomer, and eventually Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli, still limping from Aragorn's kick, met the Elves.

King Théoden bowed stiffly and said, "Hail and well met, Thranduil of the Woodland Realm. We welcome you and your Elven host to Rohan."

"Ja, ja, ja -- gut tö be meetin' yøu dere az vell, hörsey-king fella," Thranduil replied a bit less formally. "Wavy land ye be götten here in Røchand. It were måken me zee-zick gøink ump und down, ump und down, ump und down --"

Théoden raised an eyebrow, but Götterdämmerungsdottir quickly interceded for his lord. "King Thranduil thanks thee for thy hospitality, wise and lordly Théoden," the Elvish captain said with the usual Sindarin tact. "And we thank thee for allowing us swift passage through your green and noble land. You see, many years ago we got lost --"

Thranduil, who had made himself dizzy describing the undulating meadows of Rohan, suddenly decided to rejoin the conversation. "Ve åint be gøtten löst, seely Sindar," the king scolded his captain. "It were more like" – and here Thranduil paused to consider his words more carefully – "Ve vås yust takin' å royal prögress trew dem várious lånds hinder und long dåt be yunder our wássalage."

"But, begging your pardon, my lord," Götterdämmerungsdottir interrupted, smiling nervously at the angry Rohirrim contingent, "Rohan is not a vassal state of Mirkwood. The only reason we are here is we took a wrong turn at the Anduin –"

"One of many wrong turns!" the lieutenant Fjalarvilhjálmsson said in a barely contained whisper to Þórssonorðlenska, who giggled under his glove.

"Dåt'll be enöugha' dåt, schnøtty li'l wással-types!" Thranduil growled. "Yust cos' ve tøøk zum times a' getting' høme don't mean ve be löst!"

By this time, Éomer had lost all patience with the Elves. "Do you mean to say," Éomer hissed in disbelief, "that you Elves have not been sent by Elrond or Galadriel to aid us in our war with Saruman? That, in fact, you Elvish folk have been lost and wandering about for years?"

Götterdämmerungsdottir, Fjalarvilhjálmsson and Þórssonorðlenska all sheepishly nodded in the affirmative.

"Nein, nein, nein!" Thranduil yelled and stomped his feet. "Ve knøws 'zactly vere ve vas a' göink all der times!"

The whole group, including his own Elvish lieutenants, glared dubiously at Thranduil. The ElvenKing's upper lip quivered and beads of sweet sweat pearled in Eldarin opalescence upon the ivory skin of his Sindarin brow. Then a sly grin curled around Thranduil's bright white teeth and he replied, "Back in dem dere ølden-time dæys, ve Elvisch-types had un alliance mitt you mørtal-folken types. Ve vere før fighten dåt dere vun-æyed, zycløpæn fella –"

"_Sauron_," Götterdämmerungsdottir added helpfully.

Ja, ja, Zauron," Thranduil continued. "He vas dis mean øld necröphile—"

"_Necromancer_," Götterdämmerungsdottir corrected.

"Vizardly, mågiks-type, zorceror-kinda-fella," Thranduil spat with a scowl at his captain. "Anywhö, ve all gøtts togeder for der cømmon gut und whupped dåt der Zauron in der lund of Murder mitt der Schådöw guys."

Götterdämmerungsdottir rolled his eyes and sighed. "In the _land_ of _Mordor_, where the _Shadow lies_."

"Murder, Mordor -- it's åll der schåme ting," Thranduil shot back. "I vås dere, weissenheimer, mitt mein poppa, Oropher."

"Deah owd Gwand-dad," Legolas sniffed.

Thranduil's fiery gaze shifted to his son. "Und yust vat're you doin' heren, Leggy-lås?" the king growled. "Vat've I done told ye 'bout playin' mitt der mortals? Nöw, gø be gettin' to yer røøm, hair-stylin' seesy-feller!"

"Don't be widicuwous, fawtha!" Legolas cried. "You can't tweat me wike that; I am all gwown up, and wiw pway wif whomeva I wish."

"Døn't be a' giffen me yer seesy båck-tålk, Leggy-lås, or schuren as I'm der Elvisch keeng I'll be a' tåken ye ø'er mein knees und schpånken der liffen dæglichts outter yer durn heinie!"

And there was silence.

Théoden, who had napped through the entire dialogue, was first to register his confusion. "Ummm…What was that last part?"

"Våt part're are ye tålkin' bout?" Thranduil replied.

"After the 'sissy back talk, Legolas' part," Théoden sputtered. "Everything afterwards."

"Våt? Schuren as I'm der Elvisch keeng I'll be a' tåken ye ø'er mein knees und schpånken der liffen dæglichts öutter yer durn heinie?"

"Yes. That. Whole. Part."

The men of Rohan looked to Götterdämmerungsdottir, who merely shrugged in vain and turned to his lieutenants Fjalarvilhjálmsson and Þórssonorðlenska, who conferred quietly for some time. When several minutes had expired, Fjalarvilhjálmsson bowed to King Thranduil and said, "Your majesty, could you perhaps repeat that sentence? Slowly?"

Thranduil frowned and bit his lip. Heaving a great sigh, he said phonetically: "Schuren as I'm der Elvisch keeng--"

"As sure as he is the ElvenKing," Fjalarvilhjálmsson repeated with difficulty.

"I'll be a' taken ye ø'er mein knees--" Thranduil continued.

"I will take you over my knees," Þórssonorðlenska said with a smile, quite pleased that he had gotten an easy section for translation.

"und schpånken der liffen dæglichts," Thranduil added.

Fjalarvilhjálmsson and Þórssonorðlenska conferred again. Þórssonorðlenska finally nodded in approval and Fjalarvilhjálmsson said, "And spank the living daylights –"

"öutter yer durn heinie," Thranduil finished.

"Out of your damned behind," Þórssonorðlenska completed the sentence.

There was a further uncomfortable silence.

"Well then," Éomer said anxiously and clapped his hands, "I have to go inspect the lower ramparts." He then walked away briskly, quickly followed by just about everyone; or, at least, everyone with any common sense.

**_~~oo~~OO~~oo~~OO~~oo~~_**

BBC War Correspondent Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque here, once again reporting from that green country under a swift sunrise, Valinor_. _Having traveled westward and inland from Tirion-upon_-_Túna (and I will refrain from any mayonnaise references here), we have at last come upon the 'Halls of Waiting', a sort of retirement home for dead Elvish folk not important enough for reincarnation. Herein, we are seeking an interview with the quintessential bureaucrat, that mordant administrator of Aman, prognosticator of prophetic premonitions pregnant with portent, master of dooms and obtuse one-liners, Námo – or, as he is better known throughout Middle-earth, Mandos.

**Mandos:** _No, I do not mind._

**Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque:**_ You – you don't mind what?_

**Mandos:**_ I do not mind if you call me Mandos._

**BURP:**_ But I haven't asked you that question yet._

**Mandos:**_ It does not matter, you may call me Mandos._

**BURP:**_ Oh…very well then. Now, what –_

**Mandos:**_ I cannot answer that one._

**_BURP:_**_ But I haven't asked –_

**Mandos:**_ Sorry, let us move on to the next question, to which the answer is yes._

**BURP:**_ Okay then, what about—_

**Mandos:**_ Most likely, but only on a limited basis._

**BURP:**_ And yet—_

**Mandos:**_ Certainly not, it was a mistake._

**BURP:**_ You could have –_

**Mandos:**_ That was not part of my Doom. However, I foresaw it._

**BURP:**_ Amazing._

**Mandos:**_ I thought so._

**BURP:** _Therefore –_

**Mandos:**_ It was only a matter of time._

**BURP:**_ So, no chance then?_

**Mandos:**_ None whatsoever._

**BURP:**_ And the --_

**Mandos:**_ The Noldor? Overweening pride._

**BURP:**_ Fascinating. _

**Mandos:** _She does not love you, you know. It is all about the money. And you need not beg._

**BURP:**_ I beg your pardon – _

**Mandos:**_ I just said 'you need not beg' -- I grant pardons for a living._

**BURP:** _But you said 'she does not love me', are you referring to my wife? Is she using me for my money?_

**Mandos:**_ I did not say that._

**BURP:**_ Yes, you did. Just now._

**Mandos:** _She prefers the penis of your neighbor. It is much larger._

**BURP:**_ Good Lord! Do you mean Bertie? I thought he was gay!_

**Mandos:**_ It would seem he swings both ways. Rather like Finrod Felagund. 'Hewer of caves' indeed._

**BURP:**_ Oh my --_

**Mandos:** _I also suggest you reduce your cholesterol intake._

**BURP:**_ Why, am I heading for heart disease?_

**Mandos:**_ I cannot answer that._

**BURP:**_ But you just said –_

**Mandos:**_ Do not tempt fate; thou cannot escape it._

**BURP:**_ But my cholesterol intake –_

**_Mandos:_**_ If you divorce her, she will get the house._

**BURP:**_ But I bought the house before we were married!_

**Mandos:**_ You will not be able to cover up the murders of Bertie and your wife. But look at the bright side --_

**BURP:**_ There is a bright side to all this?_

**Mandos:**_ Because of the fatal heart attack, you will not serve any jail time._

**BURP: **_I…I am speechless._

**Mandos:**_ It matters not; what you were going to say is, 'This has been Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque, BBC News, reporting from the Halls of Mandos in Valinor.'_

**BURP:**_ One last thing. Is this where I will end up when I die of that heart attack after murdering my wife and Bertie?_

**Mandos:**_ I know not where you go for your after-life. You are mortal, after all._

**BURP:**_ Well, you know every other bloody thing, why not that?_

**Mandos:** _I was only joking._

**_BURP:_**_ Joking about what, foretelling what I shall do, or where I shall end up after death?_

**Mandos:**_ Yes._

**BURP:**_ Asshole._

**Mandos:**_ That is not much of a curse. And I am a professional, I should know._


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve: A Rather Rocky Battle of Helm's Deep, Part I**

**PULP FANTASY FICTION OVERTURE**

Erkenfurter:

_Frank Frazetta's forgot_  
_He gave it his best shot._  
_Hid In the bathroom very late at night:_  
_A nubile Amazon clad scant'ly _  
_With your dear old dad frantically_  
_Clutching his…poster very tight._

_And poor Robert E. Howard_  
_Proved he was no coward;_  
_But alas, he was still forced to punt,_  
_For a hated Halfing stole the game -_  
_One Frodo Baggins by name -_  
_And in dismay, the Cimmerian grunts._

_Pulp fantasy (oh-oh-oh) fiction friction,_  
_Along came a philologist (oh-oh-oh) with better diction._  
_Elves, no longer fairies (oh-oh-oh) No more poppin' cherries…_

**WE INTERRUPT THIS 'ROCKY HORROR' PARODY OF THE 'TWO TOWERS' FOR A BREAKING NEWS FLASH:**

BBC War Correspondent Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque here at the besieged ramparts of Helm's Deep. We have been given unprecedented access to the battle by the omniscient narrator, who has kindly consented to my roving about amongst the combatants without fear of disembowelment or interfering with anyone's suspension of disbelief. Not that that has been a concern for most of the book.

In any case, we have left the walls of the keep and are heading towards enemy lines where, it has been rumored, Saruman's forces are ready to unleash a WWoMD, Wizardly Weapon of Mass Destruction. Such weapons have been supposedly banned by the Gondorion Convention, along with cross-breeding Orcs with Men, the use of Rings of Power for purposes of domination, giving Trolls the ability to sun-bathe and genetically mutating wolves into were-ponies. Unfortunately, as with all wars, these prohibitions have fallen by the wayside. Because war isn't nice.

Oh, here's a rather buff duo of Uruk-hai lugging what seems to be the very implement I have just mentioned.

**BURP:** Excuse me, is that a mine?

**URUK #1**: No, dat aint a-yours. It's a-Saruman's.

**BURP:** I wasn't aware Orcs had Italian accents. But what I meant was: is that a land mine - an explosive?

**URUK #2:** I am not entirely sure. We were told to light the fuse and wait.

**BURP:** Wait? Wait for what - for the bomb to explode?

**URUK #1: **Attsa right, smart guy. We wait.

**BURP:** But...you'll be blown to bits.

**URUK #1**: So? We gotta medical insurance. Saruman, he justa give us long-term disability and a graduated pension plan based on years of a' service.

**URUK #2:** Aye. We shall be set for life.

**BURP:** Well, I suppose there is something to be said for social security. But don't you two understand? You are carrying a 'high explosive' – a device that will destroy this entire wall…

*silence*

**BURP:** …and you along with it.

**URUK #2:** Oh my. I'll have to get more coverage.

**URUK #1:** Mebbe we go anda see our union steward. I'm notta sure iffa dis falls unner short-term or long-term disability.

**URUK #2:** Good thing payroll hasn't started deducting employee contributions as of yet.

**URUK #1:** I requested mine unner pre-tax, sose I don't take a bigga hit.

**BURP: **You get payroll checks?

**URUK #2:** No, actually it is based on a percentage of pilferage, plunder and booty.

**URUK #1:** Yeah, sose if we kidnap a man, we get the liver, heart anda the guts, but the arms anda legs, they get deducted.

**BURP:** Ah, I see: you get a 'cut' of the body parts.

**URUK #2:** Yes, that's why it's called 'booty' – it's the meatiest part.

**URUK #1:** But dissa whole 'blown to bits' thingy, I'm notta sure iffa dat was part of wage concessions inna the last contract for us hourly employees.

**URUK #2:** Yes, it sounds rather unilateral.

**URUK #1:** Yeah. Dat Sharky, he got some 'splaining to do!

**BURP:** Yes, it certainly seems that the wizard Saruman has some explaining to do. And with that clever segue, we send you to BBC's infotainment newsreader, Maria Isabelle Labial-Fumar, live at the fortified encampment of Isengard for an exclusive interview with that mover and shaker of Middle-earth, that dark lord-wannabe, that mysterious Maia with the Technicolor dreamcoat, Saruman the erstwhile White. Cue the _Tabloid: Middle-earth_ theme song!

_Da-da-da-da-da-dah, Tabloid: Middle-earth,_  
_Da-da-da-da-da-dah, Tabloid: Middle-earth-_  
_TMe's got the pics_  
_For your Legolas fix,_  
_Get a dragon-horde's worth!_

_Da-da-da-da-da-dah, Tabloid: Middle-earth,_  
_Da-da-da-da-da-dah, Tabloid: Middle-earth -_  
_TMe's got the scoop,_  
_We'll dish out all the poop_  
_On the Elves lack of girth._

_We fabricate sordid lies_  
_To increase market-size -_  
_Tabloid: Middle-earth!_

**MILF:** Thank you, Borstal. Maria Isabelle Labial-Fumar of _TMe_ here in the black tower of Orthanc. Below me, I can see the pockmarked grounds of Isengard – a veritable honeycombed hive of Hell humming with the hectic helter-skelter of helmed hornets. And the character responsible for all these busy, little bees? None other than the wizard sitting next to me, Saruman, or as his henchman and cohorts call him, Sharky. May I call you Sharky?

**Saruman:** Saruman will do.

**MILF:** Very well. Good evening, Mr. Saruman.

**Saruman:** Good evening, female mortal.

**MILF:** First of all, Mr. Saruman, might I just say that beard is so twisted.

**Saruman:** Well, I -

**MILF:** I find it very sad when older men no longer care about showing their age. It's like they've just given up, don't you think?

**Saruman:** No, I don't –

**MILF:** Nothing to look forward to in their waning years except failing health, incontinence and dysfunction. Can you still get it up?

**Saruman:** Get it up? Get what up?

**MILF:** Ah yes, they say the mind is the first thing to go.

**Saruman:** I beg you pardon?

**MILF:** Exactly. I suppose wearing that hospital gown makes for easier clean up.

**Saruman:** Clean up?

**MILF:** Interesting fabric though. Shimmery. But I suppose it is washable material - for, you know, when you make a mistake.

**Saruman:** I'm not sure I –

**MILF:** That man lurking over there – the sinister one – is he your caregiver?

**Saruman:** Caregiver? No, that is Grima –

**MILF:** He licks his lips an awful lot. He's not your caregiver then?

**Saruman:** No, he is…he is my trusted servant.

**MILF:** He is, eh? Oh, I get it. Servant – wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

**Saruman:** Get what?

**MILF:** Frustrated old man. Alone in a grand tower. Obviously wealthy. Free to indulge in his sexual perversions with a younger man only interested in the money.

**Saruman:** Grima is not here for money!

**MILF:** Oh you poor, misguided old man. Do you think he has sex with you because he enjoys it?

**Saruman:** No wait - you misunderstand me.

**MILF:** All that sagging baggage and sallow skin.

**Saruman:** This is preposterous!

**MILF:** Does he bend back his lips in the semblance of a smile to say 'I love you'?

**Saruman:** Why…yes, he does, now that I think about it. But that's not the point!

**MILF: **Stay in the closet if you wish, but it is not healthy. No one likes a crabby old fag.

**Saruman:** But – wait a moment –

**MILF:** Never mind. Now, is it true you are currently playing second fiddle to the alleged Dark Lord Sauron merely as a pretext for assuming power once you've gotten the One Ring in your possession?

**Saruman:** That is categorically untrue! Sauron and I have a fine working relationship.

**MILF:** But isn't it grating to be at Sauron's beck and call?

**Saruman:** Well – no. Not really.

**MILF:** Day and night, subservient to his every whim?

**Saruman:** I have no comment.

**MILF:** Certain that you are far more capable and wiser? Waiting with more and more impatience for the day you can rub your thumb into that One Eye, and show once and for all that you have what it takes?

**Saruman:** No. Comment. Please.

**MILF:** Well, perhaps it is better Sauron is in command. You are already in over your head.

**Saruman:** Now, wait just a minute!

**MILF:** It's all right, really, quite all right. Many lesser men fail in their pursuit of greatness.

**Saruman:** I – I have not failed!

**MILF:** Anyway, you wouldn't know what to do with the One Ring if you managed to find it.

**Saruman:** I have found it! I do know where it is! And I will use it!

**MILF:** But what of Sauron?

**Saruman: **Sauron? I will crush him as easily as I have crushed Rohan – once I have the Ring!

**MILF:** Then you don't have the Ring?

**Saruman:** It is only a matter of time until the One Ring is mine! My Uruk-hai have found the Halflings who have it, and they are being brought to me even as we speak!

**MILF:** Won't Sauron be angry?

**Saruman:** It matters not. I will wield supreme power over this Middle-earth.

**MILF:** Interesting.

**Saruman:** I am at the cusp of wielding supreme power and all that you have to say is 'interesting'? Interesting in what way?

**MILF:** Well, before we began this interview I was having a discussion with some Black Riders.

**Saruman: **Ummm...Black Riders?

**MILF:** Yes, not a very talkative lot. All one or two word answers to every question: 'Shire', 'Baggins', 'the Ring'. Very Goth. I'd hate to meet them in a dark alley.

**Saruman:** And…ummm…where exactly did you see these – these black riders?

**MILF:** Oh, they're just downstairs. I thought you knew them. They seemed awfully keen on talking with you. So I had them sit down and watch a live feed of this interview while they waited.

**Saruman:** Oh, shit.

TO BE CONTINUED…


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen: A Modern, Revisionist and Decidedly Unexpected Ending**

BBC War Correspondent Borstal Ulysses Rabelais-Picaresque here at the bloody, seemingly interminable, Battle of Helm's Deep. It has been disclosed by unnamed sources that sometime late last night, Saruman's Orkish forces had overrun Helm's Dike, and she was reportedly quite pissed. After being initially repulsed from the main wall of the fortress proper, The Sarumaniacs then detonated an explosive device and thus breached the inner defenses of the Rohirrim. Thousands of Orcs are pouring into the citadel. It looks like the archetypical heroes within Helm's Deep are in for a rough go.

Wait…wait a moment. Another army has appeared on the field – and the Orcs are dispersing! I can't quite make out their flags and ensigns. Roger, move the camera up to that rocky outcropping; let's see if we can get a better vantage point.

Ah yes, I can see from here that a battalion of UN Peacekeepers have taken up a position along the eastern slope of the valley. Helicopter gunships are buzzing us overhead. But instead of discharging their machine guns and autocannons, they are dropping fliers. Thousands of fliers are littering the entire valley. My, I'll bet the extravagant use of paper will infuriate the excitable Ents! Hand me one of those, would you please, Roger? Thank you. Let me see now, this pamphlet (a rather fancy affair in three colors) is written in four languages: Westron, Rohirric, Dunlendish and the Black Speech. And no, I don't mean Ebonics, rather, the language of Mordor. In any case, it reads as follows, and I quote:

_**The United Nations Security Council has designated Helm's Deep and it environs as an area of conflict. Therefore, UN Peacekeeping Forces, under the direction of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO), have been deployed to act as a buffer between warring parties pending troop withdrawal and bilateral negotiations. Forthwith, combatants will adhere to the following directives, provisos and addenda:**_

_***** Saruman's forces shall vacate their present position and retire to a line north and west of the River Isen. They should not eat any people on the way. _

_***** The Rohirrim and the various and sundry mythological creatures allied to the Rohirrim (i.e., Elves, Dwarves, Huorns, Ents, etc.) should disperse immediately. _

_*** **The aforementioned mythological mercenaries shall leave at once to their legendary countries of origin (or at least to the abodes they have resided in during the 3__rd__ Age). Failure to do so will result in arrest and the confiscation of magical baubles, heirloom weaponry and elvish dental floss._

_*** **Dunland shall be granted limited autonomy until such time as they learn to write and then devise a constitution, or until the UN loses interest in this conflict and Rohan reasserts its suzerainty._

_*** **The terrorist group 'The Istari' has been outlawed. The principal leader of the group, Gandalf 'the White' (AKA Gandalf the Gray, Mithrandir, __Tharkûn, Incánus, Ollie), is wanted for assassination of a Goblin King, terrorist activity __and fomenting rebellions in Eriador, Rohan, Gondor and Rhovanion,__ as well as destroying the pristine habitat of the endangered Misty Mountain piping plover by dropping a dead Balrog on its exclusive nesting sites. Saruman 'of Many Colours' (AKA Saruman the White, Curunír, Curumo, Sharkey) has fled Isengard and is presently living in exile with his boy-toy, one Grima 'Wormtongue', in Venezuela, which currently has no policy for the extradition of fictional wizards. Radagast the Brown (AKA Radagast the Brown) is not being sought for any crime, although he has begged us to arrest him for something. Anything._

_***** The illegal strip mine known as Moria has been designated a hazardous waste site, with extremely high levels of the heavy metal 'mithril', a known carcinogenic agent. As a UN superfund site, remedial technologies will be employed to reduce toxicity levels (i.e., permeable reactive barriers, air sparging, evaopotranspiration covers), and the area will receive brownfield tax abatements once the clean up is complete (the development of a strip mall is in the planning stages). The Dwarves have been sanctioned in an effort to indemnify the UN for the costs of the clean up._

_*** **The Elves (i.e., the Eldar, Noldor, Sindar, Silvan, Laiquendi, Moriquendi, Calaquendi, Tandoori, etc.) will be repatriated to Valinor, as they have no place in the modern world. And they are definitely silly._

_***** Gondor has been renamed 'Canada' and shall henceforth be known primarily for Mounties, bilingual traffic signs and maple syrup._

_***** Sauron Gorthaur, despotic tyrant of Mordor and titular leader of all things evil, shall remain a Dark Lord indefinitely, as he has veto power as a permanent member of the UN Security Council. But he has been warned in the strongest possible terms that he has been very naughty._

_***** The 'One Ring', the primary source of contention and bellicosity between the combatants since the end of the 2__nd__ Age, has been confiscated from one Frodo Baggins, a hobbit, and has been auctioned off to defray the costs associated with leveraged loans accrued and owing to the World Bank by both warring parties. The highest bidder was Yuan Ka-Shing, a Hong Kong real estate financier and noted collector of Wizard of Oz paraphernalia, including Judy Garland's ruby slippers and whisky bottles, and the cowardly lion's furry codpiece._

**~~oo~~OO~~oo~~OO~~oo~~**

"Great - just great!" Aragorn grumbled as he and his comrades left the rubble and carnage of Helm's Deep. "Now I'll never get into Arwen's pants."

"Been there, done that," Legolas shrugged.

"I've had better," Gimli agreed.

**~~oo~~OO~~oo~~OO~~oo~~**

"Well, Mr. Frodo," Sam said as he slung his backpack over his shoulder, "I guess we'd best be making for home."

"Oh Sam. Poor, poor Sam. Benighted but devoted Sam," Frodo sighed in his usual dreary, mooning melancholy. "We shan't ever be going home."

Sam shot a quick, irritated glance over at his master. "Errr – Mr. Frodo," he replied gingerly, "they've taken the Ring. All them warring factions are at a peace conference that'll drag on for ages. There's naught left for us to do here."

"Oh Sam. Dear, dear Sam. Plebian metaphor for the common ma…"

"I want a raise," Sam interrupted.

"What? You want a raise?"

"Yes. And dental coverage. And social security benefits for the Gaffer."

"Sam, whatever do you mean?"

"Begging your pardon, Mr. Frodo, but you can't expect the Gaffer to get by on a diet of 'taters, not after pret' near 50 years of service to the Bagginses. It just aint right."

"He has a roof over his head, doesn't he?" Frodo shot back, now somewhat annoyed. "And just last year I gave him one of my old iron tubs to soak his corns in."

"Now, look, Mr. Frodo," Sam replied with a decided edginess in his voice, "this here whole enlightened despotism – and you bunch of patriarchal squires what's running the Shire - aint going to make it from here on in. The people've got to have a say in what's what!"

"You've been listening to the Marxists again, haven't you, Sam?"

"Oh sure!" Sam howled. "Speak a word about labor rights, and your ilk is off their heads, blaming it all on bloody Chairman Mao!"

"Is Mao a Stoor?" Frodo said in confusion. "I don't believe I've ever seen him at a Fallohide fête."

"That's it!" Sam spat and started to stamp off. "I quit!"

"Wait, you can't quit!" Frodo bellowed indignantly after him.

Sam wheeled about, his face beet-red. "What? What do mean, 'I can't quit'?"

Frodo sighed and tried to sound a bit less confrontational: "Sam, poor, poor Sam - there's a certain manner in which business is conducted in the Shire. There is order and tradition. We'll go home and you'll marry Rosie Cotton, and your children and their children will faithfully serve the Bagginses, just as you and the Gaffer have. It is the way of the Shire."

Sam was about to shriek in a great gout of inchoate rage, when Frodo added, "And I'll let you wear my green vest."

Sam sputtered a moment and then finally blurted, "The velvet one? With them brass buttons and the fob pocket?"

"Yes, dear Sam."

"Well, that's a bit different then, aint it?"

Once again bosom companions, Frodo and Sam walked down the road that led out of Ithilien.

"What's the worldsies coming to?" Gollum hissed in dismay as he peered fom the bushes where he was hiding.

"We wonders, precious, yes we wonders-s-s," Bilbo replied dismally from the adjoining bush.

Gollum tapped his chin impatiently, at a loss for ideas. "And what should we do next, m'dear?" he finally asked Bilbo. "Has it gots a plan?"

"Yes, precious-s-s," Bilbo winked. "We're off to Hong Kong to gets our birthday present."

And arm in arm, Gollum and Bilbo set off for Hong Kong and a new adventure.

As they walked into the sunset, Gollum smacked his lips and rubbed his hands together briskly. "Oh! they gots koi there, my precious. P'raps we can gets ourselves some koi."

"What's koi, precious, what's koi?"

"Goldfishes, m'dear. Big 'uns."

"Smeagol, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. _GOLLUM_."


End file.
